Leavings
by Honesty
Summary: The One Ring lies in the hand of Isildur - and no power yet remains that can save him. SLASH Elrond/Isildur, Cirdan/Elrond NOW COMPLETE!
1. Chapter 1

  
Title: Leavings - Chapter 1  
Author: Morrighan aka Honesty  
Rating: PG-13/R This may get ... interesting later on.   
Pairings: Elrond/Isildur, Cirdan/Elrond  
Warning: I do not write about nice people, nor do I do nice things to them. I've never yet written a happy ending. Be warned.   
Disclaimer: I may worship the great man, but to pretend to be him is just downright greedy. These are Tolkien's characters, y'know, not mine.  
Archive: Anywhere! Just tell me where.  
Feedback: The more the better.   
A/N Here we are in 3441 of the second age, & Isildur's got this ring, my precioussss. This is (hopefully) true to the book, though I have added & embroidered liberally. (Okay, I'm pretty sure that slashing Elrond with *anyone* isn't true to the book, but you can't have everything.) In particular, most of Cirdan's background is invented, including Finandil and the delightful Narglin.  
  
  
  
"Orcs' teeth! Are you trying to kill me, Half-Elf?"   
  
Elrond did not look back, merely quickened his pace further. "Come *on*!" He continued to climb, dragging Isildur along by one arm. The Man scrambled along behind him with an oath, and slipped again, his feet sending down an avalanche of stones behind him.   
  
Walking softly in their wake, Cirdan stepped quickly sideways to avoid the avalanche of stones that Isildur had sent down the mountainside. The screes of Mount Doom were hard walking even for an Elf; he was not about to attempt to walk a landslide.   
  
A breeze had sprung up, and he tensed his shoulders against it as its foul breath stirred his hair restlessly about his shoulders. He could feel - as always - the grime of Mordor on his skin, fading his white hair to a dull grey, and giving his face the look of one already half-dead. The dust and ash got everywhere: he and his people had even had to shave their beards off, for they caught too strongly the smell of the smog. The less disciplined of them cursed daily the foul air and the tainted water, and the separation they felt here from all living things. And why not? It was easier to curse than to mourn.  
  
And yet we must all mourn.>> Some part of his mind was grieving already for his foster-son, but he locked it down with an ease born of the long years of war. There was not yet time for grief - not for many days to come.  
  
He looked up, fixing his eyes firmly on his task and his destination. To think on Ereinion's death now would undo him.  
  
Elrond and Isildur had outpaced him again, and he quickened his step to catch them up, his feet careful on the treacherous scree. Not even an Elf could walk on this stuff with ease, and certainly not to keep up Elrond's near-reckless pace through the cinders.   
  
Cirdan frowned, uneasy. The Peredhel was normally the soul of patience, of the few numbered among the Wise, and yet this last hour there had been a most uncharacteristic rashness in his actions - a rashness that was more likely to antagonise Isildur than win his cooperation.   
  
Isildur ... yes. If Elrond's actions concerned him, it was nothing to his fears for Isildur. The Man worried him more, every passing moment. The hand that had picked up the ring was now clenched tightly about it, lest it fall in one of his sudden slips. It was palpable as smog, the sudden change in the Man's manner. And why should that surprise me?>> he asked himself. It is a fell thing ... Who knows what evil things it contains?>> But after all, if someone had to bring it to the chasm, better he than most here. Few either of Elves or Men had his strength of spirit, but nonetheless -   
  
No; he would have fretted for any who had touched the ring, and Isildur rather less than most. But nonetheless, Cirdan was fearful.  
  
They had tried to tell him, both of them. Cirdan had been barely a stone's throw from Isildur when the blow had been struck, and had been at his side before the ring had cooled. Elrond had arrived but few minutes later, walking, running, leaping impatiently over the dead and dying to reach his comrades, as Cirdan had begun to explain to the Man what needed to be done.   
  
We tried to tell him. We did everything we could,>> Cirdan reminded himself. It did not feel like enough. The Man had not been resistant - too dazed after the passing of his father, and the fall of Sauron, Cirdan supposed - but not amenable either, appearing hardly to hear their words, regarding Elrond with narrow-eyed suspicion and disregarding Cirdan altogether.   
  
It was strange, because Isildur had always treated the Elven commanders with respect and deference, even when relations had stood strained between the Elves and Men. He and Elrond in particular had been close comrades throughout the the last seven unholy years. Cirdan had heard some whisper more than that, but these he had ignored. The Falathrim did not consider it seemly to speak of such things. And besides, it was no concern of his.  
  
But their council had made no impact, and after an hour of futile words he'd watched Elrond grow desperate, haranguing his comrade-in-arms, cajoling, even pleading, to Isildur's increasingly stony face. And was that wise, Elrond?>> he had thought, and not dared to say. Elrond, whose judgement was esteemed wherever the stars shone, had seemed in an ecstasy of desperation to have lost his wits.  
  
Finally, Cirdan reached the top, watching as Isildur flung himself down to rest against the rocky wall of the mountain.   
  
"Isildur! Come *on*!"  
  
"Enough! You've dragged me halfway up this accursed hill. At least give me the chance to rest first."  
  
"There's no time! It *must* be destroyed."  
  
"'Must be destroyed!" Will you shut up about that infernal trinket for once and let me rest? He's dead and the rest of us are dog-tired and want to sleep."   
  
He fell silent, and Cirdan, looking down, noticed that the hand which clutched the ring was clutched so tightly the knuckles stood out white.   
  
Elrond looked towards him, just once, his eyes imploring, desperate.   
  
"He's right, you know," Cirdan said gently, laying aside his helm and shield and crouching beside the Man. "It is a fell thing, wrought for great evil. Who knows what damage it may bring you? The sooner it is destroyed, the better for us all."  
  
"It has done nothing to *me*. I feel no different."  
  
"Nonetheless ...." Cirdan overrode Elrond's strangled exclamation. "It would be better were it done quickly. If you wish one of us to assist-"  
  
"No!" Isildur scrambled to his feet. "It is mine, and mine alone! I slew him. It is a token of our victory."  
  
"It is yours indeed," Cirdan said, with an ease he was far from feeling. "But no good will come of it while it remains on Middle Earth."  
  
Isildur turned to stare at him, his eyes filled with a disquieting coldness. "It is precious to me," he said softly, and Cirdan almost shivered. Isildur had never been cold - much the reverse, in fact, famous for his hot temper, his compassion, the strength of his kindness and his friendship. This was not ... this was not *right*.  
  
"Isildur - come!" Elrond seized the Man by the arm, and dragged him bodily into the fissure. Cirdan did not follow them. The warning of his heart told him it was already too late.  
  
Ereinion - foster son - was your death even now for nought?>> He closed his eyes as the grief rose again, only half-listening to the voices from the chasm beyond. The sounds were vague, baffled and distorted as the syllables echoed off the rocky walls.  
  
"... must be unmade ..."  
  
"... let you take it for yourself? Am I ..."  
  
"...your father have wished ..."  
  
"...never..."  
  
"... No! Isildur!" Elrond's voice rang out, and in the two words was a desperation and desolation that tore at the heart. It did not take an Elf's ears to read its message.  
  
So then ... so it must be.>>  
  
Cirdan watched as Isildur stalked past him without so much as a glance, and stride down the treacherous scree of the mountainside, seemingly careless of his safety. His choice is made,>> he thought sadly. And I pity him.>>  
  
"Isildur!" Elrond was standing again at the cave's mouth, his voice taut with desperation. "Isildur, by all that we once had-"   
  
The Man gave no sign that he had heard the words, but strode on, the cinders shifting and sliding under his heavy steps. Cirdan watched as he slithered down two yards of the treacherous slope and disappear from view. He sighed slightly and turned back to Elrond, noting the desolation in his eyes, the face shiny with sweat and dark with the dirt of Mordor.  
  
"Thus fails the hope of men." Elrond's voice was tight and tense, as if holding in check some emotion too powerful to be displayed. He still stood in the mouth of the fissure, his body taut with tension, an arm wedged against the rocky edge as if to hold himself upright.   
  
Cirdan bowed his head. " I am very much afraid so. But do not blame him too -"   
  
"Blame him! How *can* I blame him?" Elrond rounded on him, his eyes blazing with rage. "He has been stuck here seven years in this accursed land, fighting this accursed war, with neither light nor peace to aid him. He has seen his people die before his eyes, his brother struck down - he has seen his father die this day. Do you not think it would weaken any of us - Man or Elf?" He glared at Cirdan, daring him to speak, to disagree with his words. "How can I blame him *anything*?"  
  
Cirdan allowed his gaze to be held for a long instant, and then stepped forward, laying a hand on Elrond's shoulder.  
  
"Come," he said quietly. "You're weary."  
  
"No. I am angry," Elrond said hoarsely, brushing Cirdan's hand away roughly. "A fool was I ever to believe in the wisdom of men."  
  
"They are but a young race, even now. I remember too much of the Ages of Stars ... It was too many generations before we ourselves learned wisdom."   
  
"Then spare me *your* wisdom now! You never loved a mortal, did you? You never lay with one. You never felt their touch."  
  
"Elrond! Do not speak such-"   
  
"They are so different from us, Cirdan, if you but know it. So different and yet so like. Their mouths taste stronger, their eyes ... you never saw it, did you, the beauty of their eyes? ... and their hands, rough as bark, and so urgent ... so desperate." Do not tell me this!>> Cirdan implored soundlessly, but Elrond seemed beyond reason. He drew in a shaky breath, but it seemed to do nothing to calm the wildness of his eyes. "They live such brief lives, such brief, futile lives, and then they die ... but - but I thought we would at least have a mortal lifespan together."   
  
He swayed suddenly, and Cirdan reached out instinctively to steady him. The wildness in his eyes faded, a candle suddenly extinguished, and he sagged heavily against Cirdan's supporting arm. "I am a fool, Cirdan," he whispered, as Cirdan shifted his stance to support the sudden weight better, feeling helpless and awkward. The physical contact was making him uneasy.  
  
"No. You are weary." He sighed heavily, surveying Elrond and wondering whether he was fit to walk. "Come. It is time we returned to our troops."  
  
For a moment he thought the Half-Elf had not heard him, and then Elrond gave a shuddering indrawn breath, and straightened up, his face carefully emotionless. "My apologies, Lord Cirdan. You are quite right, of course. Let us go."  
  
They made their way down the slope, Elrond walking a little way in front of Cirdan, his stance upright and dignified. No sign of his recent storm betrayed him.  
  
Cirdan paused for a moment behind his comrade to gather up his helm and shield once more. He could feel himself starting to shake. Nobody - but nobody - had dared speak in such words in his hearing for so long. It was Falathrim custom never to talk of such things, not even among close kin. The songs of the bower were a private matter between those who shared them. They were never, ever, for others' ears. And since the fall of the Falas - since Finandil's death - he had forsaken such songs forever.   
  
* * *  
The year 474 of the first age...  
  
By some miracle, the harbour still held.  
  
Eglarest itself was in flames, and he could hear the shouts and ululations of the orcs as they swept through it, towards the quickly-diminishing line of Falathrim warriors. The small crowd remaining on the docks pressed closer to the last of the ships as they awaited their turn to board.  
  
There would not be enough time, short of a miracle.   
  
"Hold! Hold!" Finandil voice rose from the line of soldiers, and Cirdan heard others take up the cry. Futile. They could not hold much longer; he could see that. If help came, it would be too late.  
  
He turned to his sister Narglin, who stood beside him, handing an Elf-child up the gang-plank to its mother. "See that all get clear," he said, and ran towards his line of fighters, unsheathing his sword even as he ran.  
  
The line was stretched too thin, and he headed for the weakest point, in time to cut down the first of the force that broke through. One look at his fighters told him enough, and he roared for retreat, stopping only when they fought three deep again. They would be cut to pieces before there was time to get free.   
  
He felt a hand draw him back, and turned to face Finandil, his face bloodied and his grey eyes wild, his thick black hair blowing around his face. The last of the crowd on the quay were now on the jetty, and as he looked up, he saw Ereinion mustering a line of archers along the side of the boat.   
  
"Get them to the ship," Finandil said, shouting to be heard. "One can hold the jetty alone."   
  
"No!" No. Not Finandil, of all his people.  
  
"Do it! Or waste more lives."  
  
He was right. Cirdan did not even need to stop to see that. "I will stay with you."   
  
"No." Finandil clasped him by the hand, his own hands steady and strong. "Our people need you."  
  
"Finandil!" But the word was cut short as Finandil pulled him to him and kissed him on the mouth, a hard, bruising kiss as his long black hair swirled and blew around them both.   
  
A second only, it could have been, and then Finandil pulled apart from him. "Retreat! To the ship!" he cried, pushing Cirdan roughly along the jetty as the remnant of his warriors came streaming past him. Cirdan could not move, watching his last few warriors swarming up the gang-plank, running up the mooring ropes, being pushed, pulled or dragged over the side. "Go!" Finandil screamed at him, and then Narglin reached over the bows and pulled him bodily over the side, even as Ereinion cut the moorings with his sword and the archers beside him let fly their first volley.  
  
The sails took the wind gladly, and as he regained his feet, ten feet of water already stood between them and the jetty. Finandir stood alone on the narrow stone jetty, his sword drawn in one hand, his knife in the other, as the mass of Orcs hurled themselves on him. Cirdan stood in silence, watching the lone figure of his lover, the long black hair he had loved so much whipped around him by the sea-breezes as he prepared to sacrifice himself for his people.  
  
He could only watch - the gradual crowding of the Orc fighters towards their lone opponent, and his slow retreat along the length of the jetty, his strikes with sword and knife to ward them off. He knew it would not be long.   
  
When the first blow fell, he heard himself cry out, leaping up lightly onto the rail of the ship. It was his sister, again, who pulled him away from the side, grabbing him bodily round the waist. He jumped again to his feet, and felt himself caught in a flying tackle as some other person pinned him bodily to the ground, hooking his arms behind him.  
  
"I am sorry." It was Ereinion's voice, and it sounded as though the boy was crying. "Cirdan, I am so sorry. If there had been any other way-"  
  
Cirdan had merely lain there under him, his cheek to the wood of the deck, and waited for the world to end.  
  
* * *  
  
Cirdan returned from his remembrances with a shudder. That had been so long ago, so many centuries, before even the fall of Beleriand. It had been the last fleeting day of his joy.   
  
There had been nobody to share the language of loves with since, not in all the long years. The only person who had dared to broach the subject later with him had been Narglin, defying all convention but confident in her dual status as elder sister and chief healer of his people. And she had long since given up on him.  
  
He allowed himself a quick, surreptitious glance at Elrond, but the Half-Elf seemed to have himself well in hand, far better, in fact, than Cirdan himself. He was walking with certainty and dignity, with no obvious signs of his recent distress.  
  
Perhaps it was better that way, to let Elrond take refuge in dignity, to let the suject lie and be buried. Yes ...>> he thought, reassured. It would be better thus. This never happened. I never heard those words. He never spoke them.>>   
  
But his mind would not allow him to discard the words so easily. What could you do, in the face of turmoil that could force such words forth? There were some things, and he ought to know, which should not be left to lie. This, he feared, would be one. Alas, it required wisdom of him in a subject where he had only folly to offer.  
  
"My lords!"  
  
They had reached the smoother ground at the foot of the scree, and Cirdan saw Elrond's lieutenant, Glorfindel, running towards them. He risked a glance at Elrond, and the Half-Elf still seemed to have himself under perfect mastery.   
  
"What news, Glorfindel?" Elrond's eyes automatically began to survey the battlefield, evaluating what had occurred during his absence.  
  
"All goes well, my Lord. The last of the vermin are all but routed, and there remains but little to be done." Which meant, of course, a great deal to be done - destroying the remnants of the enemy, tending to the dead and dying, and rather a lot of what the Elven warriors described delicately as 'spring-cleaning', and the men rendered rather more crudely, carrion-burning.  
  
"And the injured?"  
  
"Are already being tended. The Falathrim, my Lord," he gave a half-bow to Cirdan, "have taken responsibility for gathering the injured and tending them."   
  
Cirdan nodded. "Who is commanding them?"   
  
Glorfindel winced suddenly, his face crest-fallen. "Your sister, my Lord," he muttered.   
  
"Ah!" Cirdan realised with a sudden pang of shock that he had not even given a thought to Narglin's welfare during the battle. The Healers were well-guarded, always, but in such times no easy guarantees existed. "She is well, then?"  
  
"She is in a foul temper, my Lord. The Falathrim endure her with fortitude."  
  
"And Celeborn's troops?"  
  
"They are attending to the last of the rabble. Isildur's Men are disposing of the dead, and the remnants of Oropher's troops with them." He hesitated a moment, his eyes flickering uneasily over Elrond's face. "Things go as well now as they ever will in this accursed place. If you wish to take your rest, there is hardly a better-"  
  
Elrond tensed, as if the suggestion angered him, and Cirdan answered before he could speak.  
  
"Quite so," he said easily. "It is doubtful we will get the opportunity again for some while. I will take your advice also."   
  
"Rest assured I will call you should there be need." Glorfindel's eyes met Cirdan's for an instant, and the look in his eyes informed Cirdan perfectly clearly that he had no intention of doing any such thing. Cirdan thanked him solemnly, and was about to turn away when Elrond spoke.  
  
"Where is Isildur?" For the first time, the mask slipped. The words rang out harsh and forceful, and Cirdan saw Glorfindel blink in surprise.  
  
"I do not know, my Lord." He answered too quickly, the words too glib to be believable. Elrond strode forward to face him, his eyes angry.  
  
"Where is he?"  
  
"I don't think-"   
  
"Tell me!"  
  
Glorfindel glanced at Cirdan in sudden desperation. "He has returned to the camp, my Lord. He said he was going to rest."  
  
"Elrond ... you must not-"   
  
"Do not tell me what I must not! Do you take me for a child?"   
  
He turned and strode away, and Cirdan met Glorfindel's eye for an instant before making to follow him. Elrond turned back and faced him.  
  
"Do not follow me," he said softly. "Either of you."  
  
He turned away once more, and was gone.  
  
  
  
TBC


	2. Chapter 2

TITLE: Leavings - Chapter 2  
AUTHOR: Morrighan aka Honesty  
RATING: PG-13/R This may get ... interesting later on.   
PAIRINGS: Elrond/Isildur, Cirdan/Elrond  
WARNING: I do not write about nice people, nor do I do nice things to   
them. I've never yet written a happy ending. Be warned.   
DISCLAIMER: I may worship the great man, but to pretend to be him is   
just downright greedy. These are Tolkien's characters, y'know, not mine.  
ARCHIVE: Anywhere! Just tell me where. Library of Moria: yes.  
FEEDBACK: The more the better.   


A/N: Chapter 2! Not very much slash in this ep, my sweets, but rather a   
lot of swearing and soul-searching, not to mention Thranduil as you've   
never seen him before.   
  
Sorry about the delay - this got rewritten three times and then Real Life   
[tm] rather rudely intervened. Still, now we have it.  
  
Many thanks to Maureen Lycaon for pointing out a nasty little blooper for me.  
I'm forever indebted to you.  
  
  
  
  
  
They watched in silent stillness until Elrond was out of sight, hardly daring   
to move. Glorfindel's eyes flitted about the battlefield, as if searching for   
some elusive deliverance; Cirdan merely stared after Elrond, his face grave.  
  
"We cannot simply abandon him," Glorfindel said under his breath. He felt   
helpless; and the feeling was unaccustomed, even after the long years of   
siege. To do nothing would be intolerable, and to be barred thus from   
helping pained him.  
  
"No," Cirdan said heavily. "We cannot abandon him - and nor do I propose   
to." Glorfindel glanced across at him sharply, looking at him closely for   
the first time. He looked grey and gaunt, and slightly unsteady, and   
Glorfindel found himself wondering if the long years of war had taken too   
severe a toll on him. "I will seek him forthwith."  
  
"I will go with you," Glorfindel said quickly. "My path leads towards the   
camp also. We are building the pyres a mile upwind of it."   
  
They set off in the direction of the camp, walking quickly in spite of the   
weight of fatigue that hung on them. "What ails him?" Glorfindel asked   
softly.  
  
He saw Cirdan hesitate, glance round as if afraid of eavesdroppers, and   
then hesitate a second time.  
  
"Isildur has taken the enemy's ring."  
  
"Ah ..." The syllable was as the soughing of wind in the evening. "And he   
will not destroy it?"  
  
"No."  
  
"But that is madness. He knows what it is, and what was wrought in it,   
surely?"  
  
"Yes," Cirdan said bleakly. Glorfindel glanced across at Cirdan's face, but   
the shutters were down, and he could read nothing in it. "Yes, he knows.   
But he will not - or cannot do so."   
  
"Could it not be taken from him and destroyed? His strength is not great.   
He is but a man, after all."  
  
Cirdan paused, the pale blue eyes searching Glorfindel's face sadly. "If   
you knew that an arrow was barbed, would you pull it by force from   
another's flesh?" He asked the question without condemnation, but   
Glorfindel felt the rebuke of it and flushed.  
  
"You believe it would harm him," he said hesitantly.  
  
"No. I believe it would destroy him altogether."  
  
"And what destroys Isildur, destroys also Elrond," Glorfindel said very   
softly to himself. "Whether the Ring be destroyed or no, it destroys them   
both. Too close have they been, for too long." Cirdan gave no sign that he   
had heard the words and Glorfindel fell silent, frowning slightly at his own   
forwardness. He had long had misgivings about Elrond's fondness for the   
mortal, but to give voice to them now would be churlish, achieving nothing   
and perhaps doing great harm. "Forgive me" he said aloud. "It was a   
foolish suggestion, and should be forgotten. If another were to take the   
ring from him ... well, the danger would still remain for its new holder,   
would it not?"  
  
"Very likely. The ring has never before been out of its master's grasp. We   
do not know enough about its power to understand its effects." Cirdan   
smiled uneasily, and it seemed to Glorfindel as if he was gathering his   
strength. "Really, there is nothing we can do, but to be watchful, and to be   
at hand, should we be needed."  
  
Glorfindel nodded. "I hope we may be in time. If what you say is true,   
then Isildur is placed in mortal danger - and Elrond, too, I fear."  
  
They walked on awhile, in silence, until they drew level with the place   
where Sauron had fallen. A small group of the Men were gathered there,   
seemingly aimless in their stillness. The ground had been cleared, and   
the bodies borne away, but still the place seemed steeped in loss.  
  
Here, Elendil had fallen. And here, too, Gil-Galad had met his end. The   
Kings of Elves and Men - nay, the hopes of all their peoples - destroyed.   
And never again will their like be seen.>> For a moment, Glorfindel felt   
bereft, as the full weight of what had been lost bore down on him for the   
first time.   
  
It could have been seconds or minutes before he managed to gather   
himself again, shaking himself a little, as a dog that emerges from water,   
looking around him with eyes a little too bright.   
  
Cirdan stood silently beside him, still seemingly lost in his thoughts. And   
was that truly a cause for wonder? Well as Glorfindel had known Gil-  
Galad, and dearly as he had loved him, he could never have counted   
himself close to the King - not as Cirdan had been.  
  
Glorfindel reached out to touch the old Elf lightly on the arm, and watched   
him return to himself with a soft sigh and a softer apology, before turning   
his face again towards the camp. They continued in silence a great   
distance.  
  
"I am sorry for your loss, Cirdan."  
  
The shutters descended behind Cirdan's eyes, and the voice that replied   
was just a little too casual. "It is all our loss," Cirdan said with seeming   
ease. "He was a great King."  
  
"Yes. He was a great King - and we will all greatly feel his loss," Glorfindel   
agreed softly, leaving the words in his heart unspoken. But to you he   
was as a son.>> Cirdan, he knew, had never had children of his own.   
There had never been any other to usurp or to share Gil-Galad's place,   
from the days when he had been simply Ereinion, Fingon's young son,   
sent to Cirdan at the Falas to be safe from the tides of battle.  
  
Cirdan smiled, as if he heard the unspoken words. "You need not fear for   
me, Glorfindel. When the time comes, I will mourn him, as will we all. But   
until them ..." He left the sentence hanging delicately in mid-air, a silent,   
subtle dismissal of the subject, leaving the silence again to fall about   
them. The two walked on again in silence, picking their melancholy way   
through the desolation left by the long years of battle.  
  
The going was slow in parts, for the Mordor-thistles grew thick and fierce in   
places, finding any crack even in the Elven armour, and lacerating the skin   
beneath with its stings. In these parts, few bodies lay - few, Glorfindel   
supposed, had ventured this way - and those bodies which lay amid the   
thistles were torn and bloodied beyond anything he had yet seen.  
  
It was ironic, perhaps, Glorfindel thought, that for all the fires and foulness   
which had covered the land, none of them seemed adequate to clear the   
ground of its scrubby covering. Or had that been by design, to sting his   
foes with petty torments even after his passing? 'Twould be like him,>>   
he thought, and allowed himself a grim smile.  
  
He hesitated suddenly, and then halted, sensing some presence within the   
thistles at their left hand. He found that he had reached for his bow without   
conscious thought, and noted an instant later that Cirdan had drawn his   
sword, moving slightly apart from him to give himself space to use it, if   
need be.  
  
The thistles shook, and parted, drops of red blood flying from their thorns   
as a head and one bare, bloodstained shoulder rose above them, and   
Glorfindel heard an unmistakably Elvish voice crying aloud, cursing the   
misbegot thistles, the misbegot Orcs and misbegot bloody land of sodding   
Mordor.  
  
Glorfindel exchanged a glance with Cirdan, and the elder sheathed his   
sword and stepped forward. Glorfindel did not lower his bow. He had seen   
too much evil to be at ease even in victory.  
  
"Who's there? Are you much hurt?" Cirdan's voice was gentle, and the   
Elf's head turned towards him, his eyes wild and angry.  
  
Glorfindel stared at the Elf's face and frowned. Whoever he was, he could   
have been little more than a child, certainly not yet out of his first century.   
He had, still, a child's softness - a half-formed beauty as incalculable as it   
is fleeting - though Glorfindel could barely perceive it, underneath the   
severe injuries that marred the skin.   
  
The Elf-child was a mess. His hair had been burned almost all off, and   
what little remained - probably once blond, though it was nigh impossible   
to tell - was thick with blood and dirt. The gaunt face below it was dirty   
and bruised, striped by rivulets of blood from the thistles' stings.  
  
The boy lurched to his feet, stumbled, and swore again, an oath he had   
almost certainly learned from one of the rougher companies of Men. He   
was dressed in the green and brown of Greenwood, though it was so   
tattered and bloodied now that it was impossible to tell his rank or lineage.   
Cirdan caught him by the arm just before he fell again, and steadied him   
with difficulty, assessing his injuries with remote, thoughtful eyes.  
  
"Leave me be! I can stand without a nanny at my side," the boy said   
angrily.  
  
"It would be better not." Cirdan scanned him again. "That ankle of yours   
is broken and requires attention. To walk on it-"  
  
"Are you my mother, to talk thus? Leave me *be*!"   
  
Glorfindel suppressed a sigh. He saw Cirdan release the boy's arm, and   
the boy took three awkward, limping steps before falling face-first into the   
thistles again, swearing like a particularly ill-bred human. Cirdan walked   
quickly to him and picked him up once more, hauling one of the boy's long   
arms across his shoulder to hold him up, enabling him to keep his broken   
ankle off the ground. The boy opened his mouth to complain, and   
Glorfindel shot him a mock-friendly smile. "Lord Cirdan is the soul of   
courtesy, child. *I* would have slung you across my shoulder like a piece   
of baggage, and carried you all the way back to the camp. Would you   
have preferred that?" he asked sweetly, and received no reply. "Now,   
what's your name, child?"  
  
"Thranduil. Son of Oropher, King of sodding Greenwood the Great. Where   
are you taking me."  
  
"To Lady Narglin of the Healers."  
  
"Her!" The boy spat uncouthly on the ground. "She has the tact of a   
Dwarf and the forbearance of a Balrog. She-"  
  
Speak to me not of Balrogs!>> Glorfindel tensed involuntarily, shutting   
his eyes for the barest moment. It was only in the moments of his   
deepest dreams that he saw it, though he had never seen one in the   
waking world. It had haunted his dreams since his youth, long before he   
knew what the creatures were. Not nightly, nor even often; but whenever   
he dreamt most deeply, then he would dream it - odd fragments of   
remembrance of fire, of pain, of stars above and the bare rock of a cliff   
edge under his feet, of falling, falling, falling, and another falling with him.   
  
He shivered, and pulled himself together. It was considered unnatural for   
an Elf to fear his dreams. He had never mentioned this one to any other,   
save once, to Elrond.  
  
"The lady Narglin also happens to be my sister," he heard Cirdan say to   
the boy, with more amusement than censure in his tone, but the boy gave   
no sign of having heard the comment.  
  
"I hate this place," he said morosely. "Hate this whole sodding war. Wish   
I'd never have listened to father in the first place. Never did have any grasp   
of sodding strategy, did he?" He stumbled and swore loudly. Glorfindel   
looked around, wondering if they should consign this distasteful creature to   
the care of one of Cirdan's people and continue unhampered.   
Unfortunately he could see only two within earshot, and both were already   
encumbered with the wounded.   
  
Thranduil, unfortunately, now that he had begun to speak, seemed to have   
breached a dam of silence. "He dragged us all along here, all five of us,   
and now they're all dead but me. Tatharlas and Aelinsil took charge after   
he got himself killed, with me and Neldor at the flanks - as if we knew the   
first thing about warfare! He even brought my youngest brother along - and   
he not even in his fiftieth year yet! Got himself cut to pieces by Orcs two   
weeks ago. I was right beside him and I couldn't do a bloody thing about it   
- not a bloody thing. It wasn't fair, he was just a child, he shouldn't even   
have been here. Legolas, his name was, he always was the best of us."  
  
He coughed, and shivered, and began speaking again, as though it was no   
longer in his power to be silent. "Give him another hundred years, and he'd   
have made a rare bowman. Poor little sod never got the chance. They   
should have left him at home. Should have left me at home, come to that.   
I don't fight well, and I don't like war. I like easy living, I like wenching and   
drinking, and I haven't had a wench in seven years. Haven't had a drink   
either, come to that, all thanks to sodding Sauron. I hate Mordor - even   
the water stinks."  
  
He stumbled again, and cursed, and straightened up, resuming his inane   
ramblings. "Shock," Glorfindel murmured softly to Cirdan. "It takes them   
that way, sometimes."  
  
"No, no, I'm just fine. Give me a drink, and I'll be even better." He   
stumbled again, and this time Glorfindel was forced to take his other arm   
to stop him collapsing altogether. "Can't believe they're all dead,"   
Thranduil said, his speech slurring and indistinct. "Can't believe it. Only   
left me to run his sodding kingdom, hasn't he?"  
  
He went limp suddenly, hanging emptily between the two of them.   
"Unconscious," Glorfindel said unnecessarily, and Cirdan swung the   
young Elf up easily to carry him in his arms. Glorfindel stared down for a   
moment, at the injured childish face and battered body.  
  
"Poor young idiot," he said softly, and then he turned away. "Let us be   
going. We have delayed too long already."  
  
  
* * *   
  
  
"My Lord?"  
  
The voice seemed to come from far away, and it took Elrond a few   
seconds to realise that it was he who had been addressed. He wheeled   
round to face the speaker, startled from some futile remembrance.  
  
"My Lord, are you injured?"   
  
It was one of the commanders of the Falathrim, a tall elf with dark hair, and   
eyes that seemed almost black. The name was Galdor, his mind informed   
him, and he wondered fleetingly if Cirdan had sent him. "I am not, I thank   
you, Galdor," he replied shortly. "Merely in need of rest, as are we all."  
  
He left without waiting for a reply, quickening his steps again towards the   
camp. Am I injured? No; it is Isildur who needs our aid.>>  
  
Isildur never needed any man's aid.   
  
He would be furious if he believed it was being given unwanted. It had   
always been his way, even when Elrond had first met him, a creature of fire   
and passion and pride, quite infuriatingly independent for a youth of two-  
and-twenty, as Isildur had then been.  
  
He had been so young, with such responsibility already on his shoulders -   
and yet had not let it steal his passion for life. He would entice danger,   
and then dance away from it unscathed, often untouched.  
  
Always had he seemed to invite trouble, and many of the Elves had seen   
him as little more than a foolish, unreliable human, unfortunately the heir to   
a great man's throne. Few had seen beyond it, to the flair with which he   
would extricate himself from all manner of woes. Luck, it must have   
seemed, and luck, often, it was called; but it had been self-made luck,   
opportunities created out of nothing, or slim chances recognized and   
seized. More than once Elrond had owed his own life to Isildur's talent for   
luck; and many others, too, had found their lives preserved by Isildur's   
misnamed rashness. Seldom - if ever - had *he* needed others' aid.  
  
He needed it now; he would never accept it.  
  
And in all honesty, Elrond could hardly believe himself in a fit state to give   
it.  
  
He had known for many centuries that love could tear a soul apart; but   
never before had he realised that his own feelings had strayed so close to   
that madness. It was well enough to acknowledge the love that he had for   
Isildur; but to be so much mastered by it-! He had become little more than   
the helpless victim of his own emotionalism, plunged from one irrationality   
into another, helpless to rein in his emotions or even to curb their   
excesses.   
  
It was hardly the state of mind in which to aid one who was under the   
influence of dark magic, he told himself, with quite unnecessary   
fierceness.  
  
He halted for a moment, straightened his back and raised his head, putting   
on dignity as another might put on armour. The camp was not far before   
him now, and he let himself walk faster to its gates, not heeding the   
Mordor-Thistles tearing at his ankles and legs.  
  
The guards were of his own people, and they saluted him as he entered   
the encampment. He noted with approval that they remained alert and   
watchful, in spite of the day's victory. He returned the salute without   
conscious thought, and then turned away, straight to the tent that he and   
Isildur shared.   
  
It looked no different from any of the other tents around it - small, perhaps,   
and dark inside, of the grey weave that was made only in Lorien. He   
watched it for a moment, wondering whether Isildur was within, and then,   
contemptuous of his moment's hesitation, opened the flap.  
  
It was dark within, standing empty and abandoned. He stepped inside,   
letting the flap fall down behind him, and the warm darkness of the tent   
close around him.  
  
Isildur had been past that way: he had left his armour and helm behind   
there, flung carelessly on his bed-roll like discarded toys. It was typical of   
him, a compulsive untidiness that military training ought by rights to have   
beaten out of him years before, scattering his possessions as a tree its   
leaves, and ill-at-ease unless surrounded by his own clutter.   
  
It had been always a bone of contention between them, an old saga,   
played out many times in the last seven years: Elrond would return to find   
the tent in chaos, with Isildur reclining unconcerned in the midst of the   
mess. Elrond would scold, Isildur would tease and jeer and goad, and the   
conversation would degenerate quickly into the inevitable mock-battle - a   
battle that left him far too breathless to complain at anything, weak and   
helpless and ruing the day that Isildur had discovered the sensitivity and   
ticklishness of Elven skin.  
  
The breath caught in his throat at the memory, and he cursed his own   
weakness. Truly,>> he thought bitterly, I could hardly have bettered   
myself had I set out deliberately to exploit my own weaknesses.>>  
  
He picked up the armour to restore it to its rightful home, acutely aware of   
the smell of human skin and sweat that clung to it, a smell that was as   
familiar and intimate as its owner, unmasked even by the reek of the dark   
Orc-blood that marked it. He set it carefully on its hook on the heavy   
wooden 'tree' in the centre of the tent, and stood there staring at it in the   
semi-darkness.  
  
Where would he be now? Where would Isildur go?  
  
Nobody had ever been able to predict Isildur's actions. It had been part of   
his brilliance - his sheer power to surprise even those who knew him best.   
Elrond had known him better than most, but even that was insufficient to   
understand Isildur's particular brand of wayward inspiration, or what it might   
suggest to him at a moment's notice.  
  
But he would be within the camp, of that, Elrond could be certain; and if   
not here, then where? With others, or alone?  
  
Elrond turned his back on the armour, and walked to the door of the tent   
and looked out, letting his gaze rake along the row of small tents before   
him. Two rows of seven, belonging to the captains of the Elves and Men,   
though most of their occupants would never now return. In any of those -  
  
He could feel its presence, if he shut his eyes - an amorphous shape   
hovering somewhere on the edge of his retinas, malevolent and impersonal,   
mocking in its elusiveness. Somewhere close by...   
  
He closed his eyes, and, with a grimace of distaste, focussed on the   
cankerous cloud. A few seconds later, he started to walk swiftly to the   
tent in the centre of the row before him - the tent that had once belonged to   
Elendil.  
  
As he neared it, the awareness of the Ring's presence hardened into   
certainty. Elrond stopped outside, and for a few seconds stood there   
motionless, drawing on all the reserves of power that remained to him.   
Then he lifted up the flap of the tent and stepped quickly inside.  
  
A brazier had been lit in the corner, and the room was full of its smoky red   
light. Isildur was standing beside it, waiting for him, with a smile very like   
the one that had always set Elrond's soul on fire.  
  
"Isildur," Elrond said softly.  
  
"Elrond. I'm glad you're here." The smile faded. "We have ... many   
things ... to discuss."  
  
Elrond met his eyes for a long moment, but the eyes that once been so   
open had changed, and he could no longer read what was written there.   
Then he stepped forward, away from the entrance, and the flap of the tent   
swung shut behind him.  
  
  
  
TBC.  



	3. Chapter 3

TITLE: Leavings - Chapter 3  
AUTHOR: Honesty  
RATING: R  
PAIRINGS: Elrond/Isildur, Cirdan/Elrond  
WARNING: I do not write about nice people, nor do I do nice things to them. I've never yet written a happy ending. Be warned.   
DISCLAIMER:I may worship the great man, but to pretend to be him is just downright greedy. These are Tolkien's characters, y'know, not mine.  
ARCHIVE:Anywhere! Just tell me where. Library of Moria: Yes  
FEEDBACK: The more the better.   
  
  
A/N: This, alas, is not the episode you're all waiting for. It is merely a short interlude to buy me time before *some* people *cough*cough*Deborah*cough* start nagging me for the next episode.  
  
Still, next episode the fun will *really* start. But be warned - I may have to up the rating to NC-17.  
  
  
  
  
  
Once safely inside the gates of the camp, Cirdan paused, settling Thranduil more comfortably against his shoulder. The boy was still unconscious, his blood streaking Cirdan's armour and soaking into the clothes beneath it, and Cirdan wondered just how severe his injuries were. He turned quickly towards the Healers' tents, and made his way towards them with all the speed he could summon.  
  
He had questioned the sentries as he had entered the camp, seeking news of Isildur and Elrond. Yes, they were both within. They had gone in the direction of their quarters near half an hour since. No, they had not arrived together, or given any word of their errands.  
  
Half an hour! So long? Elrond must truly have travelled at speed.  
  
Glorfindel had turned south, not long back, down to where the pyres were being built, promising fervently to return as soon as he could. Cirdan could not be sure whether his return would prove blessing or curse. Glorfindel knew more of Elrond than he ever could, but all the same... Isildur had never made any secret of despising Glorfindel, and Glorfindel - well, he hid his own dislike but poorly.   
  
There had been rumours in Lindon some years ago that Glorfindel and Isildur had once duelled, and that neither had prevailed, in spite of Glorfindel's undeniable strength and skill, and Isildur's extreme youth. For the first time, Cirdan found himself wishing he had paid attention to the rumours. It had never been his habit to pry into others' business; but now, too often, he was finding others' business being made his own - and himself in ignorance of things he much needed to know.  
  
But first he needed to deliver Thranduil - and discharge some other of his duties he could not evade.  
  
The moment the Healers' tents came in sight, the camp seemed to become fuller, busier. He saw many of his soldiers among the milling crowds, and beckoned one of them, asking him to seek Galdor, the most senior surviving commander among his troops..  
  
The Elf walked off briskly, and Cirdan continued to ease his way towards the mouth of the Healers' tents, mindful of the injured around him, and careful not to jolt Thranduil's unconscious body. Haste would accomplish nothing, save to worsen the boy's injuries, and earn him a tongue-lashing from Narglin in the process.  
  
He would have to speak to Narglin, he knew, though he knew neither of them could spare the time. He had soldiers who were dependent on him for their command - he could not afford to neglect them even for his other duties. He merely prayed it would not take long.  
  
Near half an hour!>> The sentry's words had brought an undercurrent of fear in their wake. There was so much that could have occurred in that time.  
  
"Cirdan! My lord!"   
  
He looked up quickly, recognising Galdor's voice. The honorific always seemed an afterthought from Galdor, though Cirdan had never sensed in him the disrespect the words might have implied. Rather, it seemed to spring from some unvoiced, unspoken trust. "Galdor," he said, relieved. "What news?"   
  
"Little enough. We have charge of gathering the wounded, though it is slow work." Galdor paused to walk beside him, pushing his dark hair back from his face. "I mustered the remaining soldiers after-" he made a slight gesture with one hand which Cirdan understood without asking. "-and it seems we fare better than most. We have lost fully one fourth of our number, but of those that live, few seem severely injured." He paused, and it seemed to Cirdan as though he suppressed a sigh. "You could say that we have come off very lightly."  
  
"Aye. I suppose you could say that." Galdor's twin brother, he knew, lay among the dead. "If any could be said to be lucky in this place."  
  
They had reached the entrance to the tents by now, and stepped over the threshold. They had been greatly enlarged since Cirdan had last passed by them - Narglin, with her usual ruthless unsentimentality, had commandeered two of the larger barrack-tents (Amdir's and Oropher's), and joined them to the healers' tent to make a single, large enclosure. Already it was becoming crowded, though, with both Healers and Falathrim going briskly about their assigned tasks without fuss or confusion. He could see Narglin in the far corner, working among the most gravely injured, with three other of the most experienced Healers.  
  
As they entered, a Healer came close to inspect the boy's injuries, and then gestured to Cirdan to take him to one of the far beds, not far from Narglin. Galdor followed him as Cirdan continued to question him about the welfare of their troops.   
  
"But you are well?" Galdor asked. "We feared for you, when we did not find you after the battle."  
  
"I am well enough, and that is more than can be said for most here," Cirdan said mildly. "I have had other duties to fulfill which took me away for a while. I understand my sister has taken the command? Does it go well?"   
  
"Yes ... She has the art of it - whatever some might say. She has sent a third part of the troops to rest for a watch; the remainder are here or out seeking the wounded."  
  
"That is good." Galdor looked in need of rest himself; but then, who did not? "I am told she has been somewhat ... peppery ... of late."  
  
Galdor gave a nervous glance in her direction and lowered his voice. "Things do not go well, my lord. We are short of supplies, and particularly of water, and there are many wounded and too few healers. It is ... trying ... for us all." Another nervous glance; he lowered his voice further. "It does not help that Glorfindel of Imladris has been trying to commandeer your troops for the spring-clean. She is ... furious ... with him, Cirdan."  
  
Cirdan could not restrain a smile at that. "I can well believe it, Galdor. I shall be tactful, when I speak to her." He paused, a touch awkwardly. "I must warn you, though, that I will probably be leaving her the command at least a watch longer. There are things I must do which cannot be put off. Should she no longer need the Falathrim, you will have charge of them, of course." Galdor accepted the responsibility without question, though Cirdan perceived the flicker of grief in his eyes. It had been his brother Lindor who had been the highest of Cirdan's commanders, and it had been Lindor's death that had gained Galdor his command.   
  
"I fear that is unlikely," he said softly, glancing round at the fevered activity of the crowded tent.  
  
"So do I."  
  
They had reached the place the Healer had indicated, and Cirdan set Thranduil down on the bed carefully, as another of the healers came over to oversee the new arrival. "I had best leave you now, and see if Narglin will speak to me." He took his leave, and they parted, Galdor walking briskly back to the door of the tent, to resume his search for the wounded, while Cirdan approached, with only a the slightest edge of trepidation, the corner where his sister worked.  
  
It was a few seconds before she finished her task and looked up, and then rose to greet him. She was a tall woman, as tall as her brother, with hair as black as his was white. Like all the female healers, she dressed as her male colleagues did, her hair hacked off level with her shoulder blades, and bound back from her face with a length of leather cord. She was not fair to look on, even by the low standards of Men, but a light burned in her eyes like a bright flame, and on the rare instances when she smiled, she shone like fire.  
  
Now she did not. She looked as greyed and as exhausted as Cirdan felt, and as she reached for a basin of water to clean her hands he noted the lines of tension in her face. Her movements, though, were as brisk as ever, and her eyes still held their accustomed watchfulness.  
  
"Cirdan," she said by way of greeting, but she did not smile. She made no enquiry after his health: she could see that he was uninjured, and did not waste her time on niceties when there were injured to attend.  
  
"Narglin," Cirdan said. "I know you have no time to spare, so I will be brief." She gave him a single suspicious glance, though she did not cease from cleansing her hands and tools. "I - I need you to keep command of my people at least a watch longer - and possibly more. I have other duties that I cannot neglect." He saw the relief in her face, but he asked the question anyway. "You will not be inconvenienced by my absence."  
  
"Of course not." She gave him the reproachful glance she reserved for those who insisted on asking unnecessary questions. "I will have need of their services a great deal longer than -" She whipped round suddenly to glare at a very young Healer in a corner. "You there! Leave the beds - it is water we need, not linen!" The healer, who had been folding blankets two rows of beds away, from her flinched as if stung and then hurried away. "Lackwit," Narglin muttered under her breath. "You would think he'd be able to follow a simple order by now." She turned back to Cirdan, her face impatient. "Was there anything else?"  
  
"One thing. Have Isildur or Elrond passed this way?"  
  
"Cirdan! Do you truly think I would know? I have hardly had time to breathe, let alone to note who passes by." She paused in her work an instant, and then yelled for clean knives. One of the Falathrim came quickly with an armful and presented them to her. She took them and then turned to Cirdan with a grim smile. "Though I am quite sure Elrond at least has not passed this way. I would not have let a healer of his calibre out of here lightly."   
  
She clearly caught some unguarded expression in his face for she stopped her inspection of the knives and stared at him, narrowing her eyes into two fierce pinpoints of light. "He has been harmed?"  
  
"No ... yes .... He is not himself."  
  
"Cirdan! Can you give no better diagnosis than that? Really, there are times when I-" She stopped, narrowing her eyes at him. "I see. You mean in spirit ... you ask about Isildur also. Do you mean-?"  
  
"You knew about them?" Yet again, Cirdan felt the weight of his ignorance.  
  
Narglin gave an impatient sigh. "I am a Healer. It is my place to know these things. So ... you consider him in danger, and Isildur also."  
  
"Yes." Cirdan had often wished for a less perceptive sister. The wish had never been granted.  
  
"Then what are you doing loitering in here? If you are needed elsewhere, go!"  
  
"Narglin ... They are ... If they ... I mean, I cannot simply intrude in such matters."  
  
Narglin glared at him for an awkward instant, and then her eyes softened. She laid the knives and the other utensils aside, and led him to the tiny enclosure in the corner that she wryly called her office. "Tell me," she said, and her voice lacked the harshness it had held before. "But do so swiftly."  
  
He did so, swiftly, giving the whole story of the last few hours in a few, unemotional words.   
  
"Well!" she said pensively. "If that is how it stands, I see no choice. There can be no option but to intervene - though you will need to tread carefully."  
  
"I?" A sudden bolt of panic. Cirdan looked up sharply, but what he saw in his sister's eyes gave him no comfort.  
  
"Could any other do this?"  
  
"Narglin ... I am the last person qualified to offer help in these circumstances."  
  
"On the contrary ... Remember you have had nearly 2 millennia of experience in handling such things." She reached out and touched his ring finger lightly. Her meaning was plain. "I know of nobody else here so qualified."  
  
"But-!"   
  
"But nothing! If you must intrude, you must. It cannot be helped - this is too late to be nice about people's feelings."   
  
With that she left, and with that Cirdan was forced to be content. Though he could not help but feel that it had been many years since Narglin had been nice about any creature's feelings. He sighed and straightened, and, setting his face grimly, left the healers' tents.   
  



	4. Chapter 4

  
TITLE: Leavings - Chapter 4  
AUTHOR: Honesty  
RATING: R   
PAIRINGS: Elrond/Isildur, Círdan/Elrond  
WARNING: I do not write about nice people, nor do I do nice things to them. I've never yet written a happy ending. Be warned.   
DISCLAIMER: I may worship the great man, but to pretend to be him is just downright greedy. These are Tolkien's characters, y'know, not mine.  
ARCHIVE: Anywhere! Just tell me where. Library of Moria: Yes  
FEEDBACK: Please! The more the better. Tell me if you love it, tell me if you hate it - but most of all tell me if I'm butchering the characters.  
  
A/N: I know, I know! A thousand, thousand apologies for the delay. This was an absolute sod to write, and I'm still not sure it works emotionally.   
  
Still, Deborah should be happy now - for all of about a week.  
  
Can I issue a special plea for feedback here? This is the first sex scene I have ever, *ever* written - het or slash - and I'm still a little flabbergasted that I even attempted it. Before I attempt another one, I badly need to know whether it works.  
  
Elrond has come out rather more of a wuss than I'd have liked. Alls I can say is, he's had a hard day at the office.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
The brazier crackled uneasily in the dimness of the tent, and a sudden cloud of acrid smoke gusted up from it, the uneven light falling on figures of human and half-human alike, motionless for an instant in the silence of the smoky tent.   
  
For a long moment their eyes met, the Half-Elf's grey eyes meeting emotionlessly the changeable sea-green ones of the Man. Now that the time came, Elrond felt curiously calm - uninvolved, almost - as if he had passed beyond the furious ravages of emotion into the precarious stilness at the eye of the storm.  
  
"Yes," he said, and as he spoke the Elven self-possession cloaked him like a second skin. "There *is* much that we must discuss, Isildur."  
  
Isildur stared at him for a moment in silence, and gave a heavy sigh. "About the Ring, I suppose?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
A rough bark of laughter that grated on Elrond's ears. "Need we begin all that again? Surely we have already said everything that could conceivably be said on the subject in a thousand years."  
  
"We have said much, Isildur. But we have resolved nothing."  
  
"Oh? So what *does* it take to resolve this?" The words were brash, the eyes behind them cold, with a flinty light in their depths. "Must I capitulate and destroy it before you will be satisfied?"  
  
*This* was not Isildur, Elrond reminded himself. Isildur was being used by the ring. He didn't know what he was doing. He would never say such things normally.  
  
"You know it must be destroyed. We agreed it years ago. *You* agreed to it."  
  
"Oh yes! I agreed to it - but he's dead now. What evil can it have now he's gone?"  
  
"Evil is still evil whether Sauron lives or no." Elrond could feel his palms growing damp and sticky with sweat, but the tension did not betray itself in the harshness of his voice. "That ring is still a thing of evil. It must still be destroyed before Sauron's power can truly be broken."  
  
"You cannot be certain of that."  
  
"I *am* certain. I can feel its power, Isildur," Elrond said heavily. I can see what it is doing to you, he thought. "And its malevolence."  
  
"Malevolence? I feel none of it!"  
  
"You are blind to it, Isildur. You are trifling with things you do not understand. You know what this ring is. You know what it has done, and what it can do. You know what must be done to destroy it."  
  
"I know nothing except what you would tell me. And how do I know that you do not have your own reasons for speaking thus? You Elves always have your own agenda."  
  
"Indeed." Ice-cold politeness. "So the ignorant say. I had not thought to number the heir of Elendil among them."  
  
"Elrond! Elrond, damn you, must you play the Elf-Lord at me? I *know* you only do it to hide yourself. Would you sacrifice all our love over so small a thing?" Isildur made as if to step towards Elrond, but halted, seemingly unsure. "Why can you not speak frankly to me about this?"  
  
"What would you have me tell you?" His voice came out thin and brittle, as if some small, delicate thing inside him was in danger of shattering.  
  
"Nothing! I would just have you speak openly with me - that is all."  
  
"I have tried!" Elrond could feel himself losing patience. "But you will not hear me."  
  
"No. You have tried to brow-beat, plead and intimidate. Círdan at least was reasonable."  
  
"You heeded his words no more than you did mine."  
  
"Heeded his words? What happened to the famed Elven reluctance to give advice?"  
  
For the first time, Elrond found himself at a loss for words. He stood in silence a long moment, watching Isildur with unblinking eyes, in the vain hope that his gaze and his silence alone could bridge the chasm his words could not. "It is changing you, Isildur," he said at length, slowly. "The Ring is changing you - and I fear for what you might become if you hold it too long."  
  
For a long moment it seemed as though the words had been heard. Isildur took a single, hesitant step towards him, closing completely the distance between them, his face drawn with worry and concern. "Elrond," he said softly. "I truly do not know..." He reached up as if to touch Elrond's face, but Elrond caught his hand before he could do so. There were some things he could not endure now. As it was, Isildurs fingers seemed to burn against his palm. Isildur looked across at him sharply, and the moment was lost.  
  
"Of course it changes you - you know that." Isildur's eyes became suddenly subtle and crafty. "After all, you bear a ring of power yourself."  
  
Elrond lifted his head sharply, the action almost a flinch. "What makes you think that?"  
  
Isildur laughed harshly. "Could you but see yourself through my eyes! It hangs around you like a veil of light ... blue and gold, like a summer's sky." He turned grave again. "Why did you never tell me of it?"  
  
"It was not mine to tell. Some things are very deep."  
  
"Yes. I used to think our love was one of them."  
  
Elrond said nothing, merely willed his facade of dignity to stand firm.   
  
"Elrond... Elrond, look at me, damn you! That ring changes you - I can see you drawing on it now." He strode forward and gripped Elrond hard on the shoulder. "I've known you almost thirty years - and in all that time I have *never* known you as you truly are - never known you as you are without it.  
  
"Isildur-" They were standing perilously close now. The grip on his shoulder did not relent.  
  
"Would you discard *yours* if I asked you?"  
  
Somehow his self-possession stood firm. He met the eyes level with his, searching in them for something he recognised - something of Isildur. "It is not mine to destroy. I hold it in trust only. I do not own it." He met Isildur's eyes with a clear gaze that revealed nothing. "More than that I cannot tell you."  
  
His shoulder was released, roughly, and he had to take an involuntary step backwards to keep his balance. "Keep your secrets, then! Why should you let the foolish mortal into your confidence?"  
  
"No! Isildur, I would hide nothing from you - save those things which are not mine to tell."  
  
Isildur stared at him, his eyes narrowed and suspicious. "It seems sometimes as though we come from two different worlds. There is so much that it is not my place to know."  
  
For some reason the petulancy of the comment strengthened Elrond's hold on his composure. "I am sorry for that," he said smoothly. "For I have always shared with you what I could." He grew grave, forced himself to return to the subject in hand. "The ring you have taken - it is not like the rings of the Elves. It is a very dangerous thing."  
  
"it is a thing of great power. Would you have me throw it away - now, when we need such power to rebuild our lands?"  
  
"It is a thing of great evil. Already it has its hold over you." His eyes searched Isildur's face for a moment, and he sighed. "I fear for you, my friend. I can see its effects on you."  
  
"You lie! You would take it for yourself."  
  
It hurt, to hear those words. For an instant, Elrond was all but overwhelmed, and his makeshift defences crumbled and crumpled into nothing. He stood in dumb immobility for several heartbeats, unable to speak, to think, to act.   
  
"Do you truly believe that of me?" he asked, very quietly.  
  
His words were met by sudden, profound silence - an echoing emptiness belied by the dead acoustics of the tent's hithlain walls.  
  
"No..." Isildur seemed to return suddenly to himself again, and he looked somehow shrunken. "No .... no, of course I do not." He wiped a hand across his forehead, as if to wipe something away. When he spoke again, his voice was unsteady. "Your pardon, Elrond. I do not know what came over me."  
  
Elrond said nothing, but met the sea-green eyes gravely.  
  
"You really think that was the Ring's influence?"  
  
"I do. Did you ever speak so before?"  
  
"No .... no, I suppose I did not. I - I am sorry." He drew in a long, shuddering breath, and his eyes when he looked at Elrond were full of pain and horror. "Elrond? What have I been doing?" He walked unsteadily over, to lean on the strong central pillar of the tent, staring at its canvas floor as if trying to gain answers from its close-woven surface.  
  
Isildur had never been the kind of man to apologise.  
  
"You were not yourself, Isildur."  
  
"I have been acting like a lunatic, these few hours past. What you must have thought of me..."  
  
"It was just the Ring, Isildur," Elrond said gently, feeling an obscure urge to comfort the Man. "It was not you. Do not take the blame upon yourself."  
  
"Mine were the actions. Mine was the mind behind those actions."  
  
"Not so." Best not to mention the Ring by name. Not with its influence so strongly felt, so newly set aside. "Yours was the hand, but not yours the mind. Do not claim those actions for yourself. Rather put them behind you and let us remedy the evil."  
  
"Elrond ... I am afraid. I - I know not what to say. What power is it that can change even the heart of a strong man?"   
  
"It was Sauron's doing," Elrond said harshly. "He would mock us even after his own destruction. He would destroy the things we hold most dear, in petty revenge for his own doom."  
  
"Yes ... yes, I suppose you are right. We must be rid of it - father always said that. He made us swear, as you did." his voice shook as he spoke of his father, and Elrond saw his shoulders tense. He came forward, uncertainly, to rest a hand on the Man's shoulder. "Elrond ... I could not bear to lose you too. I would not lose you for anything in Middle-Earth or outside it."  
  
And then Isildur reached forward with gentle reverence, took his face in his hands, and kissed him.  
  
He should have held back, he should have stayed in control, he should at least have maintained a distance between them - but it was too late. He had already seized Isildur in a desperate embrace, pulling the whole length of their bodies together tightly, as if his grip alone could stop Isildur slipping away from him.  
  
He looked unblinking into the eyes before him, exactly level with his, and felt the blue-green eyes gazing back at him, filling his vision and his thought until he was aware of little else, the hypersensitive Elven senses filled only with the awareness of Isildur. It was all but overwhelming: the feel of the rough, gentle hands against the skin of his face, the heat of the body that he was still holding tightly to his own, the sharp taste of the human mouth ... and the smell, the strong tang of sweat and smoke and leather that was so familiar ... so much a part of Isildur.  
  
He was aware that he seemed to be shaking uncontrollably.  
  
He felt Isildur break the kiss, the blue-green-grey eyes receding a little.  
  
"Elrond?" He saw the lips move, but the voice seemed to come from a great distance away. "Are you all right?"  
  
He loosed his hold on Isildur with an effort of will, and stepped away from him unsteadily, feeling immediately bereft.  
  
"We should not be doing this," he said, and the words came out thick and uneven, with no conviction behind them. He could feel already his body betraying him, and he did not dare look Isildur in the face. "We have much to do and this will not help us."  
  
He should not have spoken. Isildur came close again, examining Elrond's face with concerned, uncertain eyes. Even Isildur's hand supporting his elbow was too much contact. Do not come so close!>> He needed to say the words, but they could not be forced past his lips, nor could he hold back the other hand when Isildur reached out a moment later to caress his face.  
  
"I do not want to lose you," he heard the Man say again, his strong voice rough and unsteady. "Not ever. Not over this or over any other thing." He sighed, and then shook his head. "And I do not want you to lose me, either. I *love* you, Elrond - I love you as I never loved before."  
  
Ai - Elbere-!>>   
  
He could not tell which of them had moved, but he was suddenly embracing Isildur as though his life depended on it, touching him, kissing him, as all the time the pressure in his loins became more intense, answered as it was by Isildur's own body.  
  
It was a kiss that burned like fire and froze like ice, tasting of mead and salt and ashes, held until all their breath was spent. He felt Isildur's hands suddenly against the bare skin of his waist, (and when had the Man managed to unfasten his armour?) and he jolted in shock at their touch before pressing close to him once again, reaching with quick fingers for the lacings of Isildur's shirt.  
  
We should not be doing this,>> a small part of him still told him; but it no longer seemed to have any power over his thoughts or actions. The rest thought only of Isildur, Isildur whom he loved, Isildur who, he feared, would so soon be lost to him, repeating his name like a prayer in tones unheard in the haste to discard the dirty, sweaty, *imprisoning* garments that had come with him from the battlefield.  
  
And then - somehow - they were on the rough floor of the tent, freed of clothes and words and all other encumbrances, and Isildur was atop him, and he was blind, and deaf and oblivious to everything save Isildur ... the warm weight on his back, the gusts of breath on his neck and the wordless murmuring in his ear, the heavy hands, so gentle and tender on his flesh, the smell of sweat and smoke and leather, faint but so very overwhelming -  
  
And then the pain-spiked raptures of his taking, ebbing and waning like revolving moons, now light, now dark, bringing welling tides of pressure in their wake, waxing and waning but ever increasing in power and intensity, fiercer and brighter than he had ever known or dreamt it as he let himself be taken, as he *gave* himself to Isildur and to the joy and anguish of their joining, and then-  
  
And then the tide broke over them, and the world erupted in a blaze of agony and ecstasy - brightness and colour and sound and motion ... and there were no more divisions between them, none at all, and they were one.  
  
* * *  
  
Well! That was *most*...>>  
  
Words seldom failed Isildur at any time, but they seemed most infuriatingly elusive now. He was lying, drained, on the floor of the tent, the world around them dimmed by the smoke of the brazier. Elrond lay against him, his body limp and pliant, and his eyes seemed empty and stunned, drifting somewhere in the wildernesses of oblivion, his dark hair disordered and tangled about his face.  
  
Isildur reached over and brushed the strands away gingerly, studying carefully the angles and planes of the almost-Elven face with a mixture of tenderness and regret.   
  
He did not look quite Elven, as he did not look quite human, the features of his face a little coarser and blunter than most Elven faces, the body a little more muscular than the Elf, less hair-covered than the human. Neither the one thing nor the other, but somehow transcending both.  
  
Isildur was used to that: he had long grown used to the distinctions between the races, and their different appearances. But now, looking on Elrond's exhausted face, with its sheen of sweat and disorderly hair, and the eyes that were beginning to slip closed, he realised he had never seen the Peredhel look so terribly, terribly human.   
  
He could feel his eyes stinging and shook his head with a rueful half-smile.  
  
And so it ends,>> he thought sadly. I doubt that he will ever touch me again, or I him. A great pity, for I *did* love him greatly.>>  
  
He reached across for his cloak, and cast it carefully over Elrond's sleeping body, letting the folds settle gently over him. It must have been a deep sleep indeed: he did not even stir as the soft fabric covered him.   
  
Isildur watched him for a moment, leaning motionless over him as the pale eyelids slowly slid shut. Then, gently and slowly, second by second, Isildur eased himself away from Elrond's quiet body, and sat up, reaching for his clothes with clumsy, drugged hands. He reached first for the Ring, reassuring himself that it had not somehow been lost, and then for the rest of his clothes, dressing slowly and quietly in spite of the haste that snapped at the heels of his mind.  
  
He stood up slowly, staring down at the sleeping figure at his feet.  
  
I am sorry, Elrond,>> he thought to the figure on the bed. I knew you'd never understand.>>  
  
Then he turned his back on his lover, and stepped out from the tent, out into the subdued, smog-filled murk of Mordor.  
  
  
  
  
TBC  
Next: Things happen, people get hurt, and Narglin loses her temper.


	5. Chapter 5

  
TITLE: Leavings - Chapter 5  
AUTHOR: Honesty  
RATING: R   
PAIRINGS: Elrond/Isildur, Círdan/Elrond  
WARNING: I do not write about nice people, nor do I do nice things to   
them. I've never yet written a happy ending. Be warned.   
DISCLAIMER: I may worship the great man, but to pretend to be him is   
just downright greedy. These are Tolkien's characters, y'know, not   
mine.  
ARCHIVE: Anywhere! Just tell me where. Library of Moria: Yes  
FEEDBACK: Please! I live for it!  
  
A/N: We *should* be onto the easy bit by now. Two more eps after this,   
unless something unexpected happens.   
  
It might.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"Isildur!"   
  
He had almost reached the gate of the camp. He had chosen as his route   
the long, closed side of the Healers' tents, a little-used path that   
ought to have kept him from others' eyes.   
  
He carried on walking, his footsteps dogged in spite of his tiredness.   
Night was starting to fall, and he could feel the night-weariness coming   
upon him. But this was no time for rest. He would not and could not   
turn back now.  
  
He heard the footsteps quicken, and break into a run, and then an Elven   
hand seized his shoulder and spun him round. "Where are you going?"  
  
The last thing he wished now was interference. Particularly from -  
  
"Glorfindel," he said coldly. "And is it any concern of yours, where I   
go?"  
  
The Elf-Lord met him eye-to-eye, grim-faced and grave. "That depends   
rather on your destination, does it not?"  
  
Isildur's weariness fell away instantly, as though it had never been.   
"My destination is mine alone," he said harshly. And if you but knew   
the truth of that...>> he thought, with something akin to melancholy;   
you would be in agreement.>> "It is no concern of any other," he   
added aloud.  
  
"What concerns my Lord Elrond is my concern."  
  
"Oh? And who appointed *you* any man's keeper?" Isildur allowed a   
mocking note to enter his voice, and he noted instantly the pinpoints of   
colour that sprang up like stars on the other's cheekbones.  
  
"I am his liege-lord. And I can tell you, if you have hurt him-"  
  
Isildur laughed loudly in Glorfindel's face, making a mental apology to   
Elrond for the indiscretion he was about to perpetrate. "Hurt him? No!   
On the contrary, he seemed rather to be enjoying himself."  
  
"Why, you-!" Glorfindel lunged for him, his hands reaching instinctively   
for the Man's throat.  
  
Thus had they fought once before, when Isildur had been two-and-twenty   
and a visitor with his father in Harlindon. He had equalled Glorfindel   
then; and now he was older and wilier, and knew his foe.   
  
What does not wither cannot grow.>> Thus had he said then, in   
response to Glorfindel's mocking words about the superiority of the   
Firstborn. What does not change cannot adapt. What does not die,   
cannot *live*.>>  
  
Glorfindel's manner of fighting had hardly changed or developed since   
then; Isildur's had. Lopng years of sparring with Elrond - both in jest   
and in earnest - had taught him much of the ways of Elves, their   
strengths and weaknesses.  
  
His deflection of Glorfindel's hands was easy, almost instinctive,   
throwing the Elf off-balance before catching him with a hard punch to   
the floating rib before Glorfindel could regain his poise. Isildur did   
not press his advantage, but circled out of reach, his posture slightly   
too nonchalant to be called a fighting stance.  
  
"Wanted him yourself, did you?" he jeered. "I suppose you consider   
yourself more of a *man* than I."  
  
Keep him out of temper ...>> a lesson he had learned thirty years ago;   
and you have him.>>  
  
Glorfindel rounded on him furiously with a wordless yell, flinging   
himself forward with Elven grace; though Isildur seemed almost to be   
expecting the strike. His counter was a roundhouse punch, and Isildur   
put all his considerable weight behind it, throwing his whole body   
behind the blow.   
  
Had he missed the mark, he would have made himself easy meat for even   
the slowest of foes; but he did not miss. His punch caught the Elf   
firmly on the temple, and sent him spinning off-balance to the ground.   
Glorfindel hit the ground hard, and Isildur allowed himself a brief   
smirk. It died on his lips when he heard a voice behind him. A most   
angry voice.  
  
"*What* do you think you are doing?"  
  
His heart sank. Of all the worst possible ill-luck-! Lady Narglin of   
the Healers.  
  
She stood at the side-seam of the tent, which seemed to have been slit   
open, her jaw clenched, and her eyes brightly angry. She was taller   
than he by three inches - and Isildur did not account himself a small   
man - and right now she stood close enough that he could not but be   
conscious of her height - or her anger.  
  
"My Lady," he said quickly, trying for charm. "I do apologise for the   
disturbance. A matter of honour, merely ... I fear the venue for our   
dispute was most ill-chosen."  
  
"Isildur, is it not?" Isildur nodded, and then bowed. To his   
annoyance, his mouth had gone somewhat dry. "I daresay you have   
forgotten, but this is a Healers' house, not a tavern. We have *work*   
to do here. Would you have your Men die because my Healers could not   
hear themselves think?" She did not wait above a second for an answer.   
"I tell you, if you disturb my Healers again, I personally will ensure   
that you regret it - for a very long time. Take your petty and   
senseless brawls somewhere else next time - or you will be scrubbing   
bed-pans until the end of Ea."  
  
She looked down at Glorfindel, who was half-lying, half-sitting on the   
ground, shaking his head slowly, as if to make sure it was still   
attached, and gave an irritable sigh. "Glorfindel of Imladris! I might   
have known. Interfering in others' business again, I presume."   
  
But Glorfindel seemed too dazed to realise that he was being addressed,   
and gave no sign that he had heard her words. Isildur glanced around,   
wondering if it would be possible to slip off quietly, but she wheeled   
round to face him again. "Lord Isildur, I care nothing what status you   
hold here. My Healers are stretched almost to their limit already. The   
last thing I wish is more casualties."  
  
Isildur allowed himself a small smile at that. "Then let me tender my   
apologies. There will be no more casualties, my lady," he said easily.   
"Not from my hands."  
  
"Is that so?" Three blunt, heavy syllables, dropped with hard precision   
into the silence. Her eyes were narrowed at him, but he could still see   
the flames that danced at their centres.  
  
Isildur tensed. She knew. She knew about the Ring.  
  
There was a sudden ringing in his ears, and the ring itself seemed   
suddenly to grow huge and heavy. He could feel its weight burning   
fiercely through the fabric of his tunic where the white linen touched   
his heart. Like a brand, burning into his body; and the marks it left   
would surely last until he died.   
  
He shivered, as if with sudden cold, and then drew himself up to his   
full height, schooling himself to hardness.  
  
"I suppose you think you know where I am going," he said.  
  
She met his eyes coldly, and he had the sudden impression that she was   
looking deep into him, weighing and evaluation what she saw.  
  
"I believe so." He stared back at her, stony-eyed, but she did not   
break the contact. "Unlike my brother I do not make a habit of   
prescience ... but you do not live through all the ages of stars and sun   
without learning to see through a brick wall in time." A curious   
phrase. Had the time been less serious, Isildur would have stored it   
away for future consideration. "Yes, Isildur ... I know where you would   
go."  
  
"And would you stop me?" Isildur folded his arms, his feet   
shoulder-width apart, uncaring of the confrontational message of his   
body's language.   
  
There was long silence, and he felt the piercing blue eyes weigh him up   
critically. There was an intensity in that gaze that burned like fire;   
and for a moment he could have sworn he saw a burst of livid flame about   
the tall figure. He felt a sudden jolt, as of lightning down his spine.   
"No," Narglin said, her voice remote and terrifying. "I will not   
hinder you. You will tread your path alone - as you have chosen."  
  
Isildur said no word, and made no sign, but turned, and walked swiftly   
towards the gate of the camp. He could feel the twin fires of her eyes   
boring into his back as he departed - and did not look back.  
  
* * *  
  
They say that smell is the handmaid of memory.  
  
Or rather, the races of men so say, for so they have found; that scents   
smelled again bring memories in their wake. The Elves say differently:   
that smell is the master, and memory the slave. For them, so much more   
terrible is its power - for Elven senses are sharper, their memories   
longer, and their hearts less guarded from harm.  
  
Thus it was that Círdan stood like one paralysed, in the door of   
Elendil's tent, his eyes momentarily unseeing as he stared in, his mind   
bludgeoned by the sharp tang of sex and sweat in the air, and reeling   
under the force of its assault.  
  
Not since Finandil-  
  
Too long had it been, and nothing had he forgotten; and for a moment the   
memories claimed him entirely. The long days when they had wrought   
together on the bones of the great ships, and the secret nights, when,   
satisfied by their labour and sated by their lovemaking, they had lain   
side by side, their bodies touching, talking of everything and nothing   
until sleep took them their separate ways until the dawn. Sweet days,   
so wonderfully perfect, and so cruelly ended.  
  
He wrenched himself away from the memory before it could overwhelm him,   
and commanded his eyes to focus on the interior of the tent. His brain   
seemed mazed, and not minded to cooperate, and it was long seconds   
before he could gather himself enough to recognise what he found there.  
  
All was still and silent within, and Isildur was not there. Only Elrond   
lay before him, his eyes closed and his body draped with the Man's   
cloak, cradled in the hold of a sleep far deeper than the Elven   
dreaming. It did not take a seer to understand what had occurred.  
  
But Isildur was not there.  
  
Círdan let out a soft sigh, wondering whether to leave and seek him, and   
leave Elrond alone. There was nothing he could do here, after all, and-  
  
He was about to turn away softly when he heard Elrond stir slightly in   
his sleep, his eyelids flickering drowsily somewhere between dream and   
waking. Only for an instant - and then they snapped open as he spun   
abruptly to wakefulness.  
  
"Isil-?" Elrond hauled himself quickly into a sitting position and   
stared wildly about him. Círdan saw his shoulders tense, and then sag.   
"He is gone," he heard Elrond say to himself quietly. And then, almost   
inaudibly, "I should have expected it."  
  
"I fear so." Círdan did not move from the door of the tent.  
  
Elrond gave a sudden indrawn breath. "I must go after him. He needs   
our aid." He stumbled quickly to his feet, still clutching Isildur's   
cloak like a talisman. "It may not yet be too late-" And then, with   
something between a gasp and a sob, he seemed to stumble and crumple,   
his legs collapsing under him.  
  
His descent was graceless and painful, and he remained motionless where   
he had landed, sitting, after a fashion, with his legs crumpled under   
him, his head hanging, with the dark hair unruly about his sweat-smeared   
face. His breathing was heavy and laboured, uneven in its rhythm.  
  
"Would you have me follow him for you?" Círdan asked quietly.  
  
Elrond lifted his head to look up at him; but he might have been looking   
on the face of a stranger for all the recognition he showed. "No. It   
is futile," he said in a voice of icy remoteness. "All this has been   
futile. There is nothing any more that we can do." For the first time,   
a spark of recognition seemed to come into his face. "Go if you will,   
Círdan," he said wearily. "It will change nothing."  
  
He fell silent, his legs still crumpled under him as he had fallen, his   
shoulders and back rounded so that the crinkled line of his vertebrae   
made an ungainly silhouette against the light of the brazier.  
  
Círdan stared at him wordlessly, still tense and half-frozen in the   
doorway, caught helpless between the need to go to him, and the fear of   
setting foot in that tent - into the space that had so lately witnessed   
so intimate an act. Every instinct of his body bade him turn and flee,   
but he was too old, and too disciplined, to give in to his body's   
impulses so lightly.  
  
He would have spoken words of comfort; but there were none that could be   
said.  
  
My poor Finandil,>> he thought in desperate prayer to one long gone,   
I fear you have left me helpless when I most need to give help.>>   
  
But that was unfair: Finandil, with his unquenchable generosity of   
spirit and his bright unfailing courage, would never have wished Círdan   
to be withered thus, crippled by past grief and held back by the   
despicable cowardice of the heart that did not dare lend another aid.   
For it *was* cowardice, and Finandil would never have countenanced it.  
  
It was not Finandil's voice that brought him his answer, though. It was   
Narglin's.  
  
Do you know, Círdan,>> she had told him, about a thousand years   
before; that you would make a healer of rare ability, if you but   
stopped wallowing in your infernal self-pity for a while.>>  
  
He had been too mindful of his own pain then to heed her words, or to   
contemplate the pain of others ... and now it was too late for   
hindsight. Now he found himself faced with one in need of healing, with   
nothing to offer save his own accursed insecurities.  
  
Narglin,>> he told the memory; I am the last person who would be   
fitted to help in such a case.>>  
  
He *needs* aid.>>  
  
But what could I possibly do?>>  
  
Círdan stared down at Elrond, still sitting motionless on the floor of   
the tent, Isildur's cloak pooled carelessly over his lap. Still he did   
not move.  
  
How can I even contemplate turning aside from another's pain?>> he   
asked himself, almost angrily.   
  
The anger did what plain reason could not. He took his first, uncertain   
step into the dark interior of the tent, and then relinquished his hold   
on the door-frame.  
  
The thick atmosphere of woodsmoke and sweat, mingled all too clearly   
with other scents, assailed him with a bludgeon's force, and every   
instinct he possessed screamed at him to flee. He was intruding into   
the most private of spaces, in the presence who one who would hardly   
wish an outsider present at such a time.  
  
Someone who needed his aid. He took another step, and a third, and the   
sharp scent of sex assailed him anew, and with it the memories of   
Finandil.  
  
Finandil would never have let him behave like this.  
  
Círdan covered the remaining distance in slow, unsteady steps, and then   
crouched to knee beside Elrond, placing a hand lightly on the Peredhel's   
shoulder. The muscles under his hand were stiff and knotted, and they   
tensed further at his light touch.  
  
It had been more than three millenia since he had touched another's bare   
skin, even in so impersonal a manner. It was almost a frightening   
sensation, unnerving beyond words. He almost jerked his hand away, and   
then schooled himself to be still, closing his fingers around the   
hunched shoulder.  
  
"Elrond, my friend," he said softly, some unnameable emotion making his   
voice unsteady. "If there is anything I can possibly do to help, you   
have only to ask it."  
  
* * *  
  
"Tuor! Go back!"  
  
Fire round about him, and flames, and a many-thonged whip, which   
threatened repeatedly to knock him from the summit. In the pass of   
Cirith Thoronath below them, the few survivors filtered through, rushing   
desperately in their haste to reach safety, their eyes upturned to him -   
he and the Balrog, as they strove together, lashed by treacherous   
crosswinds on the high stone crag.  
  
Tuor alone had not turned back. It was as if he, with some suicidal   
urge, was intent on joining him, in a battle that could only buy them   
time to flee. A battle that would surely end in his death, be it slow   
or fast.  
  
"Go back! Go!"  
  
Not Tuor. He would not die with Tuor's death weighing on his heart. He   
smote the Balrog with all the force he possessed, and once more the   
flames rose up around them.   
  
Turn back, Tuor... For my sake, go!>>  
  
In his desperation he threw himself forward onto the Balrog, screaming   
as its flames pierced him ... and his sudden weight pushed the creature   
off-balance and down, and it fell, and he fell with it, in a whirl of   
fire and flame into the darkness.  
  
Laid on a rough pallet on the floor of the Healers' tents, Glorfindel   
dreamt of Balrogs.  
  
  
  
TBC.  
  
  



	6. Chapter 6

  
TITLE: Leavings - Chapter 6  
AUTHOR: Honesty  
RATING: R PAIRINGS: Elrond/Isildur, Círdan/Elrond  
WARNING: I do not write about nice people, nor do I do nice things to them. I've never yet written a happy ending. Be warned.  
DISCLAIMER: I may worship the great man, but to pretend to be him is just downright greedy. These are Tolkien's characters, y'know, not mine.  
ARCHIVE: Anywhere! Just tell me where. Library of Moria: Yes  
FEEDBACK: Please! I live for it!  
  
A/N: Did I say I thought this was the easy bit? Let me now rescind that. Both Glorfindel and Narglin have been trying to take over my plot, and Elrond seems to have wussed out completely. At least Círdan has been behaving himself throughout.  
  
Really, it would be much simpler if they did what *I* told them to, rather than what they felt like.  
  
It's as well to observe here that Elrond's characterisation owes a strong debt to two very fine fanfic writers - to Deborah, who has written some fantastic explorations of Elrond's early years, and Arachne (AlsoA on ff.net), whose perspective on Elwing was unwittingly a massive source of inspiration for me. Also thanks to Le Chat Noir for information about Elwing and Tuor.  
  
For more information about the creatures I have dubbed 'Morgul-cats' see 'The Letters of JRR Tolkien', letter no. 219.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Isildur was gone.  
  
It was as the blow of a hammer against a vessel of glass.   
  
It was a matter too large for thought, too deep for comprehension - and yet so prosaically commonplace that to feel pain over it seemed trite and insignificant. The destruction of the Ring had been his duty this day; the only tragedy had been his failure to carry it out - and it was Isildur who would pay the price of that failure, a thousand times over. To feel pain because Isildur had left him was but irrelevant folly.  
  
He was dimly aware of the hand on his shoulder, but it was a thing distant and unimportant. Círdan's voice, offering him aid, was remote and far-removed also. He had failed in his duty. He had destroyed Isildur.   
  
Isildur was gone, and all was dark and empty. For him there was left only solitude and silence.  
  
"There is nothing that can be done. Isildur is beyond help." he said lifelessly. "You know this."  
  
A credo of despair. He felt the hand on his shoulder tighten its grip, as though trying to send a message to him that was beyond words.  
  
"I was not speaking of Isildur. And you know that." The words did not make sense.  
  
"What else is there that can be done?" He raised his head and looked up, his eyes falling on the entrance to the tent, hazy through the brazier's smoke. Through that door, Isildur had gone; and through it he would never return. "Go, Círdan - go back to your troops and leave me. You can help nobody by remaining here."  
  
"I will not do that."  
  
There was steel in the words - a half-hidden force that compelled the attention, and Elrond glanced at him, startled. The old Elf's face was set, the pallid blue eyes hard and bright with resolve. "No," he said again. "I will not go."  
  
"Why?" *Why?* Why not simply turn away and begone, and leave the matter to take its own course? What was there to be gained through such perversity?   
  
It gained him no answer. Even the long stare which Círdan's eyes gave him was devoid of answers. But Círdan's silence was more oppressive than any words could be; and almost against his will he found himself goaded into speech.  
  
"You need not fear for *me*, Círdan," he said harshly. "I doubt that it is given to the Peredhil to die of grief."  
  
A flash of understanding in the pale eyes. "*I* had not thought that. Had you?"  
  
No - I ...>>   
  
"I do not know."   
  
A death from grief ... Isildur would doubtless have regarded it as contemptible weakness, would have seen it as evidence not of deep affection, but of inability to adapt to the changing fate of the world.   
  
Perhaps it was true ... perhaps. Isildur would never have died in such a way.  
  
Elrond had watched over him, in the hard days after his brother Anarion's death, and at first it had death had filled all his thoughts. He had seen him succumb, at first, to his sorrow, seen him later grow and recover, seen him return to the battle, with a new edge to his nature like tempered steel, stronger and harder. And though sometimes he would return from his labours wan and grieving, and wishing only to hide in the secrecy of his tent, at length those times grew fewer and less painful, and he would recall his brother more with affection, less with pain.  
  
It must be sweet indeed to remember the beloved dead in such a way - with joy as well as sorrow, and, most of all, with acceptance. But Isildur was neither dead nor dying. Elrond did not have the priviledge of grief.  
  
The reminder caused him almost to flinch away, as if from some imagined pain. He heard, distantly, Círdan speak his name, but did not heed it. What then? Should I have slain him?>> he asked himself desperately. Was that what my path should have been - to destroy him if he could not destroy the ring?>> The thought wrenched from him a sound that was half-laugh, half-sob. It would have been such wretched cruelty!>>  
  
It would have been greater kindness than letting him live.>> For Isildur would be corrupted, his noble spirit choked and tainted, he would be twisted by the Ring into the enemy's tool, he would, he would-  
  
-he would be destroyed, and all their labours would have been for nothing, and all would become once more dark and hollow.  
  
If he could but have stayed watchful, if Isildur could have held out but a little longer, then perhaps he would not have fallen so. Perhaps he would not have forsaken him thus.  
  
Forsaken ... always forsaken. Perhaps it was his doom. Since the earliest years of his life - since the terrors of Sirion - it had been his fate to be forsaken.  
  
* * *  
  
The streets are burning.  
  
Elrond can smell the fire. He can hear shouts and screams out in the street. People outside are being hurt.   
  
Mother tells them to be calm. She says all will be well and she will keep them safe. She sounds frightened, and the light of the Jewel she wears seems to flicker.  
  
Elrond watches it, but he's scared, and he grips his brother's arm hard. Elros whimpers slightly, shifting in his cot to move away from Elrond. He is too little to understand. Elrond doesn't cry, of course. He's a big boy - nearly old enough to begin learning his letters - and big boys don't cry. That's what his mother always says, and she never cries.  
  
He wonders why Mother doesn't try to run away. He wonders what will happen when they come. He does not wonder how he knows that they will.  
  
They sit, quietly. They wait for what is almost forever.  
  
It still scares him when the moment comes. It starts in the room below, and there is shouting and breaking glass. He lets go his brother's arm and rushes to Mother.  
  
- Mother!  
  
- No, Elrond. Stay there. Look after your brother.  
  
Elrond sits down again, though he does not want to, and picks up Elros from his cot, curling himself round his baby brother's body. Elros gives him an indignant whine, and then falls silent as the door bursts inward.  
  
It is too fast to follow; too strange to comprehend. The two elves are pale and dark with blades in their hands and eyes that blaze fire. They close on his mother.   
  
There is blood on their blades already, and their burnished black armour runs with it.  
  
Elrond does not dare call out. Ever after, irrationally, he will wish he had.  
  
Give it. Give it.  
  
They threaten, intimidate, blackmail. One of them - the shorter - even holds a blade to Elrond's eye, hovering it but a hair's width from the eyelid. But Elwing is implacable, as the taller of them closes on her, his blade held in his left hand.  
  
And then - in an instant, just as his concentration wavers - she turns and springs like a hart to the edge of the window, flinging herself out and away from them. The taller Elf swears and rushes forward, blocking Elrond's view of the window.  
  
Blocking his last glimpse of his mother.  
  
She does not look back. She said she would keep them safe. She said. But she went and never said farewell, and left them to her enemies. And Elrond has not been bad for almost a week.  
  
At length, the taller Elf turns away from the window.  
  
- So again we fail, he says with harsh bitterness. - Let us go, Maglor, before the day turns further to our ill.  
  
His companion sheaths his sword, and Elrond lets his closed eye flicker open. The taller Elf is deformed in one hand. He wonders irrelevantly whether it hurts him.  
  
- What of the little ones?  
  
- Leave them. They are worth nothing.  
  
Elrond can feel himself starting to shake. He clutches his brother tighter, and once more Elros offers a whine of complaint.  
  
- What if their mother returns for them?  
  
- Not she! Think you she will return *here*? Then think again.  
  
- They are but young! We shall not leave them here alone.  
  
- Forget them, Maglor! Would *you* be a mother to them?  
  
- I would not have them left here, that is all.  
  
He sighs slightly, his voice awed. - What kind of woman would leave her children to her enemies. And for a bauble such as that?  
  
- Shut *up*, Maglor. Are we leaving or no?  
  
The taller Elf turns away and makes to leave.   
  
- Oh ... take them if you must ... but do not expect me to have a hand in the changing of nappies.  
  
The shorter Elf comes towards him, one hand held out in a gesture of help, murmuring meaningless words of comfort and consolation. Elrond watches in silence as he crouches down beside him, beseeching Elrond to come with him, telling he will look after them.  
  
There is red blood on his armour. He scared Mother. He scared Mother, and she jumped out of the window. She is not coming back. She is never coming back again. She wanted to save the Jewel, and so she left them behind, and she did not even look back.   
  
From somewhere locked deep inside himself, Elrond hears himself start to scream, time and time again, hoarse, torn sounds that rend the soul, until he falls silent, too sore and exhausted to continue.  
  
The Elf waits for him to fall silent, and then reaches out a hand to him once more. - I am not your mother, he says nervously, his eyes flickering uneasily. - But I will care for you in her stead.  
  
Elrond looks at the hand, and he looks at his brother, and he looks at the open window from which his mother has gone. He looks at that window for a long time. Then he reaches out his own hand, shutting his eyes until he feels the Elf's hand close round his. It feels less like treachery, that way.  
  
- Like a beggar, the taller Elf says with amusement. - He settles for what little he can get. He will be a wise one, if he survives.  
  
The other does not smile. He crouches down so that his face is level with Elrond's. - Come, little one, he says. - Tell me your name.  
  
* * *  
  
"Elrond?"  
  
He could still feel Maglor's hand on his shoulder, in a grip that was almost painful; could see, through the haze before his vision, the face dimly before him, the dark, bloodstained armour below it.  
  
Like a beggar. He settles for what little he can get.>>  
  
And then, with a start, the mists began to clear, and he realised that it was not Maglor's hand on his shoulder but Círdan's, and the desertion was not Elwing's but Isildur's.  
  
He saw Círdan reach forward with his free hand as if to touch his face, and then pull it away, his eyes unreadable except for their concern.  
  
"Elrond," he asked for the second time. "Is there nothing I can do to aid you?"  
  
He wanted to say help me, stay with me, do not leave me alone, but he seemed unable to speak.  
  
And then he felt himself falling forward, and, dimly, was aware of someone catching him as the dust and ashes of unconsciousness swirled up around him.  
  
  
* * *  
  
  
Glorfindel pulled himself up into a sitting position, scowling and rubbing at the bruise on his head, not quite able to recall how it had got there.  
  
Tuor. He could remember Tuor.  
  
"You should not do that, my friend."  
  
He looked up, to find he was being watched closely by a dark-haired Elf with almost-black eyes, and lowered his hand from his temple.   
"Galdor ... what time is it? And what happened?"  
  
"It is about an hour after sunset," Galdor said. "As to what happened, I was not there, but I understand somebody hit you."  
  
Somebody *hit* me?>> "Who? And why?"  
  
Galdor shook his head. "I could not say. The Lady Narglin brought you in, and she did not tell me. She said she would speak with you when you woke." A healer from across the room hailed him, and he walked off quickly, stopping to give orders to two other of the Falathrim.  
  
Ai, Elbereth! And that is all I need!>> For a fleeting moment he wondered if it had been Narglin who had hit him, but decided it was probably not.   
  
In truth he felt unprepared for almost anything. Every second he had spent in this fell land seemed to have sapped his strength and dulled his senses, leaving him little better than the Men, who seemed almost unaffected by the foul air and water.  
  
But he remembered Tuor. He had never been able to do so before.  
  
Tuor had been short, even for a Man, pale of hair, with blue-green eyes which seemed to change their hue with the weather. He had been solitary by nature, but never remote - warm and passionate, rather, with courage that nothing could quench.   
  
He had loved Tuor, once - loved him more than he had thought it possible for an Elda to love one of the Followers, with a fire greater than he had thought could burn in Elven hearts. A fire dulled only by his shame, at feeling affection for one of a lesser race.  
  
But how if he had spoken? Would Tuor have loved him, or had his heart been set from the start on Idril? Would all have been in vain? Perhaps Idril then would have united with Maeglin, and the whole tragedy of Gondolin would have been averted.  
  
Perhaps not. It was not the Elven way for close kin to unite, after all, and Idril and Maeglin had been cousins - not to mention the fact that Idril (insufferable prig that she was) had loathed the very sight of Aredhel's son. And what was the point now, after so long, in scraping old wounds? He had sworn to protect Tuor's descendents forever until their line ended, and so he would. There was nothing more to say on the matter.  
  
"So. You're awake." As usual, Narglin could not be still, even when speaking to a patient. Her eyes, after a piercing glance at Glorfindel's face, were scanning the room, and he saw her gesticulate to two of the healers in one corner, bidding them go to the dispensary area. How any Elf could be so infernally, impatiently Dwarvish in her manner was something of a mystery to Glorfindel. He wondered for an instant if her hand signals were a variant of the Dwarvish iglishmek, and if so, how she had persuaded them to let her use it.  
  
"So I believe. What happened to me?"  
  
"Isildur hit you, if you really want to know."  
  
"Isildur ... Oh."   
  
The tide of remembrance rolled over him, somehow fused with the older memories. Isildur, Tuor, the falls of Gondolin and of Sauron, fire and flame in the night, somehow become part of Oroduin. He took in a long, shuddering breath. So much. So newly remembered.  
  
"Are you in pain?"  
  
Isildur. Tuor. So different, but yet so alike. Only Isildur's eyes reminded him of Tuor's gaze. And so much the same spirit burned in those eyes.  
  
"...I remembered Tuor... I've never done that before." He shook his head, and came back somewhat to himself. "No. I am well, I thank you."  
  
For the first time, Narglin ceased her silent communication with the Healers across the room, and gave him her full attention. "He was most remarkable - for a Man." And then a pause, in which the piercing blue eyes bored through him. "Isildur is his descendent, you know - every whit as much as Elrond is."  
  
She had already turned away to some other chore, long before Glorfindel could think of any answer.  
  
Yes...>> He could not forget that any longer. Not with the recollection of Tuor burning holes in the delicate fabric of his soul. Not when Tuor and Isildur carried so strong a resemblance between them.  
  
He had sworn to protect Tuor's kin as long as his line should last. There was probably something ironic about that, but for the life of him, Glorfindel could not think what it might be. He sighed and rose slowly, seeking out the door.  
  
  
* * *  
  
  
Círdan blinked and shivered; trying to take stock of his situation.  
  
"Elrond?"  
  
There was no anwer. Elrond had collapsed against him, seemingly into unconsciousness; and the weight of the senseless body against his was deeply disturbing. For the first time, Círdan blessed the fact that he had not had time to remove his armour.  
  
He lifted Elrond's head carefully, so that he could look into the unconscious face. The eyes were open and empty, the breathing far too shallow. His body ... there were bloody smudges down his torso from Círdan's armour, still heavily stained as it was with Thranduil's blood.  
  
Círdan looked at the smudges uneasily, at the way they marred the pale skin, clogging and sticking, in places, the fine black hairs scattered across the Peredhel's chest.  
  
To see any Elf thus marked with Elven blood was a profanity.  
  
He eased Elrond down across his knees, drawing up Isildur's cloak slightly to cover his nakedness, and reached for his water bottle. The motion flicked more blood from his armour, and Círdan sighed. He had not realised that Thranduil had bled quite so copiously over him. And that is hardly a wonder,>> noted some distant part of his mind. Oropher and his kin do nothing by halves - not even the shedding of blood.>>  
  
He worked the buckles of his armour quickly, and cast the armour off with difficulty, tossing the arm-guards after it. Then he unstoppered the flask and retrieved a clean cloth from his pouch.  
  
He looked down at Elrond, and the sight brought forth another sigh. So like Finandil, and yet so very unlike. Bright, beautiful Finandil who had always seemed so very carefree. He, too, had been strongly built for an Elf, though still slender beside the children of men. He too had had eyes of such grey, though they had been always bright with joy and starlight, not dulled by distant pain or darkened by the weight of responsibility.  
  
Something deep within Círdan seemed to clench and tighten at that thought, and he shook his head ruefully. This is no time to dream, old one,>> he told himself firmly.  
  
He unstoppered the bottle now, and poured a little of the water onto the cloth. With the armour gone no barrier now lay between him and the weight of the body against him - none save a single layer of cloth - and he felt his heartbeat quicken involuntarily, the nagging unease returning in full measure. Too long had it been ... for long centuries he had kept distant and aloof, and now his close proximity to another was disturbing beyond anything he had yet experienced.  
  
Would that this task had fallen to another...>>  
  
Though that, of course, was a foolish wish. He put the thought from him and moistened the cloth in the water, washing the blood away with broad, firm strokes, until the whole was gone.  
  
It took some little time to accomplish, and he paused, awkwardly, with the cloth idle in his hand. Elrond still had not stirred, though where their bodies touched Círdan could still feel the feeble, thready pulse that maintained him.  
  
Once more he was most uncomfortably conscious of his close contact with the Half-Elf, and now that his labours were done he had no distraction from it. He shifted uneasily, but it but made matters worse.  
  
No; inactivity was an ordeal not to be borne. As much to distract himself as because it was needful, Círdan lifted the water bottle once more, and began, with delicate touches, to wash the grime from Elrond's face.  
  
It was only when the last of the grime had been washed away that he looked down to inspect the face, and saw the first sparks of wakefulness in the dulled grey eyes.  
  
"Elrond?" he asked cautiously, watching as the eyes cleared and focussed.  
  
"Círdan..." Of all things, Elrond sounded surprised. "Why are you here?"   
Because it is my duty. Because I care. Because it matters. For Isildur's sake. For your sake. For my own sake and for that of Finandil, whom you never met.  
  
Because...  
  
He laughed, a little sadly. "I have too many reasons to speak of, my friend. Shall we just say that I do my duty?"  
  
The mention of duty caused something unreadable to flicker over Elrond's face. "I failed, Círdan. I could not save him."  
  
"We have all failed, Elrond. Do not take the failure to yourself."  
  
"What else have I left?"  
  
Not even the glib tongue of an Elf could find words to answer that, and Círdan did not even attempt it. Elrond had not tried to sit up or break the contact between them - proof, if any were needed, that he was not truly himself.  
  
Still, if it were needful, what reason could Círdan have to refuse him? Only his own crippling self-pity, which was no reason at all.  
  
"Rest, Elrond. You're weary," he said quietly. "I will watch with you."  
  
He had half-expected a refusal, but none came, and Elrond's eyes when they met his were filled only with the kind of shamed gratitude that has just pride enough left not to give itself words. He felt his heart twist within him, and his breath for an instant caught in his throat.  
  
"Sleep now," he said, with difficulty. "Sleep and take your rest."  
  
His hand reached out, unbidden, to touch his comrade's forehead; and this time he did not let himself draw back, stroking the dark hair as one would comfort a wounded animal.  
  
A part of his brain was aghast at his own forwardness, but he carried on, focussing only on the feel of the thick, coarse hair under his fingers, trying to keep himself detatched from the situation, aware that detatchment, here and now, was far beyond his reach. It was both far too long and too brief before he felt Elrond slide from waking to dreams.  
  
Círdan glanced down at Elrond pensively, his fingers still stroking the dark hair, smoothing the slight lines which marred the forehead.  
  
I thought I was guarding my heart,>> he thought shakily. All those years I kept my distance from others, and I thought I was keeping my heart from further harm.>>  
  
And yet, all the distance he had given himself had served only to lay him open. The first word - the first contact - had left him defenceless before it; and now he knew not what to do nor how to protect himself.  
  
It was not truly love - not even he was such a fool as that - but it might as well be for the havock it was wreaking upon him. He shook his head in frank acknowledgement of his own folly.  
  
He would remain with Elrond as long as he was needed: that was the heart of the matter; and he would worry about the state of his own sanity later.  
  
  
* * *  
  
  
The road was dark before him; it was hardly even a road. He could feel ash and cinders crumbling under his feet. At least he had managed to avoid the thistles this time.  
  
Isildur stumbled and let out an oath, his foot connecting heavily with some small creature. A Morgul-cat, he supposed, from the wailing yowl it gave out, and he watched it sneak away, a buff-coloured form in the darkness, the kinked tail wagging angrily behind it.   
  
Hateful, good-for-nothing creature. He walked on, ignoring it, fixing his eyes on the looming shape of Mount Doom ahead of him.  
  
  
  
  
TBC  
One more ep to go - and that belongs to Isildur, my precious.  



	7. Chapter 7

  
TITLE: Leavings - Chapter 7  
AUTHOR: Honesty  
RATING: R   
PAIRINGS: Elrond/Isildur, Círdan/Elrond  
WARNING: I do not write about nice people, nor do I do nice things to them. I've never yet written a happy ending. Be warned.   
DISCLAIMER: I may worship the great man, but to pretend to be him is just downright greedy. These are Tolkien's characters, y'know, not mine.  
ARCHIVE: Anywhere! Just tell me where. Library of Moria: Yes  
FEEDBACK: Please! I live for it!  
  
A/N: Our last episode.   
  
I've nothing to declare today, save that this has perhaps been the LotR fic that I have put the most blood and sweat into (mine, not theirs); and it is grimly ironic that it is the one that has been easily the least popular. This is probably a relic of its mixed parentage - bookverse, with a hint of movieverse and a smattering from Silm and UT added, not quite purist and not quite AU. Whatever. It's finished.  
  
A disproportionate amount of this fic of this was written listening to Dave Brubeck's Time In album, and the track '40 Days' in particular has become for me something of a summation of Círdan's character.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
The night was come; and darkness, of a kind, had fallen again over Mordor.  
  
Isildur walked slowly in the near-dark, his steps careful and deliberate. The cinders and stones of Mount Doom had been trial enough in daylight, with Elrond dragging him relentlessly up the scree; in the darkness speed would be suicidal.  
  
He had seen few of the soldiers on his path. He assumed, without giving the matter much thought, that their labours had been completed and most had retired to rest. He could have done with that himself. But not now. Not now.  
  
He could feel all too clearly the weariness that lay heavy upon him.   
  
On roads such as this he needed his wits about him, his senses clear then from the weariness that fogged them. Not even the brawl with Glorfindel had been able to lift that weariness totally, though it had been as a spray of cold water on him while it had lasted. Blind, witless Glorfindel, so blithely arrogant - he had deserved it every bit.  
  
He stumbled, and slid, swearing wildly. Now look what you've done, dammit!>> he told Glorfindel silently and unjustly, and moved forward more cautiously, his eyes fixed on his feet.  
  
He wondered how Elrond was faring, and the thought caused him a distant pang of pain. Whatever came of his errand, it would hurt Elrond beyond belief. Perhaps,>> whispered that part of his mind that was still his, perhaps beyond repair.>>  
  
He could still remember how it felt, to love someone. He had loved so many people, so very much, all the days of his life, with a prodigal generosity of spirit that held nothing back. For most of his youth he had wooed men and maids indiscriminately, with neither qualms nor conscience. It had been his way, and who had there been to prevent him? He had loved them all, in a way, before he had found what love truly could be; but there had never been reason to restrict himself. It had not been cheating for he had never made vows of exclusion, and he had treated each with respect and affection.   
  
But Elrond ... Elrond had been altogether different - a different world to all his lightly-taken previous loves. Never once had he been even tempted to take Elrond's love lightly - it had been worth too much for that. Elrond alone had been enough. Elrond had been everything to him.  
  
Apart from Linneth, I suppose>> he thought, remembering his wife with a sudden pang of something not unlike guilt; but that was no more than duty.>> Linneth had been the suitable wife, found for him by his father; and they had treated each other in the approved manner, producing the required heirs between them, with neither trespassing on the other's separate lives. it was Linneth's serving-maid, Meril, who kept her mistress warm at night, as she had for many years; and Isildur had never been so small-hearted as to object. At least he knew, he thought wryly, that none of his sons were bastards.  
  
He climbed on, finding the clag and cinders of the mountain's slopes slippery and treacherous under his feet. It was more wearisome, this road, than it had been the first time around, and he went but slowly, ever staring at his feet to keep them safe on the loose rocks.  
  
How will they remember me in after years? Saviour? Tyrant? Coward?>>  
  
But that depended on whether he had the strength to carry out his purpose, and of that he preferred not to think. He climbed on, concentrating on nothing but the rocky path before him, and the red glow of Oroduin above him.  
  
* * *  
  
He had stood here before, not six hours ago.  
  
The same pool of lava burned and bubbled far below him, as he stared down into it from the spit of rock jutting deep into its heart. It seemed bigger now, and more terrible, and he felt the urge to flee.  
  
But that would not do, and he cursed himself for a coward. Very slowly, he knelt down at the very edge of the chasm, and his hand went to the pocket of his tunic. The ring was heavy, but it did not seem to be fighting him. It sat quiet on his palm, large and beautiful, perfect in its way.  
  
It would be so easy to destroy it. So easy it was almost impossible.  
  
He tried reaching his hand out over the roiling lava below. Tried tipping his hand so that the thing could slide its way into the fire. Tried and could not, three times over.  
  
"Damn you," he muttered, and then cried the words aloud. "Damn you, Sauron, and your accursed sorceries! Why do you do this to me?"   
  
The echoes threw the words back at him unanswered, and he smirked grimly, climbing quickly to his feet. "A foolish question. Let us ruin as many lives as we can," he said mockingly, "and let us make *Isildur* our instrument. Give the Men a corrupt leader, destroy Elrond Peredhel with grief and drive a wedge a *mile* *wide* between the free peoples." The mocking tone fell away as quickly as it had come. "You base-born dog," he snarled. "Destroy me, would you? Petty vengeance, I suppose, for your own fall." He spat exaggeratedly into the lava below, though the saliva had become steam long before it reached the surface.  
  
He reached out again over the flames and managed, this time, to tip his hand so that the Ring slid along its sweaty surface and teetered over the edge - when his other hand, with reflexes faster than he had known himself to possess, reached down and caught it, clutching it so tightly that the metal ring bit into his flesh.  
  
He opened his hand and stared down at the Ring, and as it had before its beauty smote him like a war-hammer. Insanity, to destroy a thing of such beauty ...and such power.  
  
It offered him power. He could feel the invitation beckoning in his brain.  
  
"What am I thinking of? To throw it away-"  
  
He shut his hand swiftly, shaking his head to clear it of its sudden fog.   
  
"Cretin," he snarled at himself, pacing along the spar of rock that jutted into the volcano's heart. "Would you become again the dupe of Sauron and his childish traps?"  
  
This time he did not look at the thing he held. He extended his closed hand over the sea of lava below him, and bade his fingers open and release it.  
  
But not one muscle in his hand would move.  
  
He tried to lift each finger individually, but once more they stayed motionless. He even brought his free left hand over to wrench away the weakest, smallest finger, an old technique that could force even the strongest to release their grip. Still nothing.  
  
Why - why? - should it be so hard to destroy so small a thing?  
  
"You know," he told himself defiantly, "that it would be folly to keep it."  
  
It would be folly to throw it away.>>  
  
Isildur tensed, cursing his own mind's treachery, and tried instinctively to hurl it wildly into the fire ahead of him. Once more, his hand would not let the thing go, and he staggered back from the edge.   
  
He had a sudden vision of the Kingdoms of Men - of the towns of his people rebuilt and at peace, and ruled with wisdom by a great king.  
  
"No," he muttered; but he could feel himself weakening. "No, no, no." No, he would not. Let the Ring show him images of power! They were lies. "You'd make me a king of corruption," he said derisively, "with a land full of usurers and charnel-houses. Yes ... you's bring it peace - but you'd work it through fear, not contentment. Is that greatness?" he hissed at the darkness. "Is that all you have to offer me?"  
  
But his defences did not ring true. He could feel the Ring deepening its hold upon him with every second that passed.   
  
Isildur gritted his teeth, glaring down into the lava.   
  
He could not destroy it. He could not discard it. He had known that it might come to this; had only hoped that it might not be so. Why else, after all, had he left Elrond so cravenly behind him?  
  
The thought of Elrond was almost too much for him, and he had to force himself upright - force his back straight and his chin high, force his heart hard and icy.  
  
I still remember how it feels to love,>> he thought defiantly. Let me hold true to that - while it is still in my power to do so.>>   
  
And he walked determinedly to the far end of the spit of rock. It ended not smoothely, like a jetty, but harsh and sharp like a needle, coming to a jagged point less than a foot wide. Isildur came right to its end, standing poised at its extreme tip, and looked down into the fire and lava that burned far below him, on three sides of where he stood. The Ring was held tightly in his hand.  
  
"What will I be when I am gone?" he asked quietly. "Traitor? Coward? Weakling? It matters not what names they shall give me, after all. But I would have Elrond think well of me." He brought the ring up once more and held it before his eyes, and as he looked at it, he smiled, an angry, dangerous smile that made his teeth glint in the red light of the flames.  
  
"What choice do you give me, hmmm?" he asked it softly. "Meek submission to your will? Or meek surrender of my life." He closed his hand with a snap, and lowered it to his side. "It's not my habit to do any thing in meekness." He raised his eyes to the rocks above him, and then looked down into the fires below. "I have three paths," he said, forcing his voice to ring clear above the bubbling of the lava. "I can destroy you freely. I can toss myself into this fire and destroy both you and I - or I can stand here ... forever, if need be. Nobody will come looking *here*, will they now?" He paused, and his voice lowered to a growl. "If I am too weak to make a choice ... well, my body will eventually fail me, and I will fall - and *you* will fall with me. A game of chance, if you will." He gave a half-laugh, glaring at the rock walls around him. "I've diced with fortune all my life. Why should my death be any different?"  
  
He could see the livid red lava bubbling far below him, forming nameless, undulating images in the depths while orange-red flames flickered at the rim of the pool. He watched intently, trying, almost, to hypnotise himself with their action, trying to let himself forget the dreams of power and lust that the Ring was now burning incessantly into his head.  
  
He paused ... and paused longer. The seconds flickered past and he stood still, unmoving, at the very edge of the fire.   
  
Just a moment longer ... only a moment ... and he would summon the strength to make his choice.  
  
Seconds became minutes became hours, and he did not move, silent and still as the hours passed. At one point he wept, and his tears rose from his eyes as steam. But he did not move and he did not speak, and not once did he look at the ring he held, though his heart nagged constantly at him to do so.   
  
He did not have the strength, not yet, to make any choice - but he did at least have the pride not to move - not to retreat or to back down.   
  
If he kept his pride long enough he would weaken and fall - and then the choice would have been taken from him. If he could not act, he could still wait - and sooner or later the Ring would be no more.   
  
He stood. He watched. He waited ... and the lava ebbed and flowed below him like a sea of flame, and he let his mind ebb and flow with it.  
  
And so he waited, all the livelong night, as, slowly and gently, the Ring sunk its claws deeper into the vulnerable places of his mind.  
  
  
* * *  
  
  
It was the dawn that saw his strength fail him.   
  
He kept his position still, though his mind was vague from the relentless heat and mazed from the images the Ring had sent forth into it. His body felt weak and limp, his balance unsteady, and he felt he could almost exult at the immanence of his own death.  
  
He swayed slightly on the spot, and closed his eyes into it. The loss of sight made his head spin, in slow, tilting circles, and the swaying became more marked.  
  
But a few moments more...>> He did not open his eyes, and the loss of sight disoriented him further.  
  
Five seconds he lingered ... and then felt himself drift and teeter and begin to fall.  
  
NO-!>>   
  
His heart repented the moment he felt himself go, and without even being conscious of his choice, his body swerved and fought against the fall like an eel in a net, desperate to save both the Ring and himself. The Ring slipped from his hand and fell; and the tiny *clink* as it struck rock was the loudest sound he had ever heard.  
  
And then he felt himself fall also, his head striking rock so hard that all the stars of the sky danced before his vision.  
  
* * *  
  
It could have been hours or seconds until his sight cleared again. He was lying on hard stone, on the long spit of rock from which he had wished to fall, and the ring lay before him mockingly, mere inches from the tip of his nose.   
  
And all his dance with death had been for nought. At the last moment his strength had failed him.  
  
He lay still for a long moment, trying to summon the will to move. All he could see was the Ring before him, beautiful and hateful, enchanting and ensorcelling.  
  
He could see the writing again, running along the outer and inner surfaces. Suddenly he wanted to know what it meant. It promised power - power and dominion. He wanted to grab it and hold it and never let it go.  
  
I should not want that. I should not desire it.>>  
  
He rolled his head away from the Ring, trying to get away from its false promises. He would have to leave, somehow ... leave and admit himself defeated.   
  
His head felt leaden heavy, and his eyes were reluctant to look away. He twisted his head to look up at the rocky roof above him, and his eyes were met by a blaze of yellow light.  
  
A tall figure standing over him, the hair bright and golden about the angular Elven face.  
  
"Glorfindel," he said. His voice came out cracked and hoarse, and he realised for the first time how dry his mouth was. "And how long have you been here?"  
  
"I? Long enough to see many things."  
  
Elves, of course, were past-masters of the unhelpful answer. "Oh yes? Could *you* destroy it, then?" It was meant as a challenge, but it came out as a plea, and when Glorfindel crouched down by him and reached for it Isildur felt a sudden desire to reach over and snatch the thing away from him. Only the weakness in his body prevented him.  
  
Glorfindel stilled, his hand poised near it for many seconds, and then drew back from it, eyeing it with something approaching fear. "I do not dare touch it," he said.  
  
Isildur looked and met the Elf's eyes. The gaze was returned evenly, though he sensed the reservation there, as though Glorfindel suspected mockery or anger was immanent.  
  
"Do you know, Glorfindel," he said deliberately. "I do believe that was the only intelligent sentence I have ever heard you utter." He reached for the ring, and sat up, dusting the ash from his clothes and preparing to stand. "Would that I were so wise." He uttered the words bitterly and stood; and though his balance was still poor, Glorfindel made no move to assist him. "You would not care to help me?"  
  
There were many kinds of help for which Isildur might have been asking. Glorfindel had no need to ask which he meant. "No," he said firmly. "I cannot take life so lightly."  
  
"No. I supposed not ... but still-" He pocketed the Ring, and began to make his way towards the cleft through which he had come. Glorfindel stood aside to let him pass.  
  
"What will you do?"  
  
"Does it matter what I do now?" Isildur asked sharply. Glorfindel said nothing. "I shall return to the camp," he said at length. "You, of course, are quite welcome to stay here. Or come with me - I care not."   
  
"What of the Ring?"  
  
"What of it? I am bound to its fate now. Do you expect me to tell the world of my weakness?" He laughed harshly, and the laugh turned into a dry cough. Wordlessly, Glorfindel unhooked the water-bottle from his belt and handed it over, but Isildur waved it away. "No, I need nothing. I shall tell those who ask that I have taken it as weregild, for the deaths of my father and brother." Another laugh, less harsh than the first. "I shall probably come to believe it shortly, you know. I rather prefer it to the true version of events."  
  
"Then I pity you."  
  
"Orc's teeth! Do you think I want your pity?"  
  
Glorfindel smiled grimly. "I doubt it greatly. But I offer it nonetheless." And then something made him add, "and my respect also."  
  
Isildur grimaced, pausing for a moment at the tunnel's edge. "If you insist. Now, if you will let me depart, I ought to return to my Men."   
  
He began to walk away, his steps slow and not quite even, picking his way with care through the treacherous cinders. As he walked he could feel Glorfindel staring after him, the silvery eyes fixed on the hand which held the Ring.  
  
  
* * *  
  
  
"Círdan."  
  
Círdan had been almost asleep, and the voice jolted him quickly to wakefulness. He took a moment only to remember where he was and why, and then looked up without haste or alarm, no expression crossing his unlined face.  
  
It was Isildur who stood framed in the entrance to the tent - unsure, it seemed, as to whether he had the right to enter. He looked ... older, Círdan supposed, and weary, as if he had fought a great battle and met with defeat, or been tried in court and lost his plea. As if he waited only for his sentence to be pronounced.  
  
Instinctively, Círdan glanced down at Elrond, cradled in his lap, his eyes in the glazed openness of Elven sleep. His own fingers were still enlaced in Elrond's hair. He made no attempt to remove them, merely looked up to meet Isildur's eyes, gaze for gaze.  
  
"Good morrow, Isildur," he said softly. "I have been hoping to see you."  
  
"Yes. Well-" Isildur walked quickly into the tent and towards them, stopping an arm's length away to gaze down at Elrond's sleeping figure. "Tell him I ... tell him I am sorry. Tell him I could not do it." There was bitterness in his voice.  
  
"If you wait but a little, you may tell him yourself."  
  
Isidur laughed jaggedly, as though the mirth was extorted from him by force. "Círdan ... I do not know how much longer I will be capable of saying such things."  
  
Círdan looked up at him, meeting the changeable eyes without flinching, though what he read there was heartbreaking. It must be a terrible thing, to have such clear knowledge of your own doom.>>  
  
"As you will. I will tell him."  
  
Isildur looked down suddenly, at Cirdan's hand, still gently twined in Elrond's dark hair. He stared at it a long time, and then at Círdan's face, and then back at Elrond's.  
  
"So ... I suppose you sought only to help him." Círdan had expected hatred, perhaps; mockery at the least - but he could hear neither in Isildur's voice. "He will never love you, you know. Not as he can truly love." There was no bitterness in the words ... only grief, and something which sounded a little like pity.  
  
"I know that."  
  
"Yes. Yes, you would. Blindness never was one of your failings, was it?"  
  
"It is all our failing - Vala, Maia, Elf, Dwarf and Man. Perhaps ... I am inclined to think it is only our blindness that keeps us from despair."  
  
Isildur said nothing; and after long moments of silence had crowded about them he knelt down, so that he could look into Elrond's sleeping face. Círdan wondered what he saw there; wondered for the first time how Elrond might look through human eyes.  
  
"I have sworn a vow that I shall never use it," Isildur said slowly and deliberately. "My sons have borne me witness. I would die - rather than trample further on his love. I doubt very much that I have the power to keep my word - I can already feel my mind trying to forget it." He reached out to touch Elrond, but paused, and then withdrew his hand without making contact.  
  
He stood up quickly, his face expressionless - and the moment was lost. "Tell him I said farewell," he said abruptly. He turned and strode away, leaving the door of the tent flapping in his wake.   
  
Círdan gazed after him, watching him go.  
  
Such courage, and such fire, in the face of inevitable destruction. It was a glorious thing to see in this dark time, a thing humbling to witness. Isildur had been named for the moon, as his brother had for the sun; and he was bright, like the moon, and dark like it also. Such pride, too - to take his leave in such a way, to acknowledge and accept his fate.  
  
"Go well, Isildur," Círdan said softly. "And stay true - as long as it lies in you to do so."  
  
He turned away from the doorway then, and looked down at Elrond, his head still cradled on Círdan's lap, his eyes asleep. It was a strange face, beautiful in its way, perhaps, but it was a cracked and fractured beauty, riven by pain and perhaps never again to be made whole. Once more he felt the stirring inside him, though whether of love or pity, or the two mixed together he could not tell.  
  
A fool am I,>> he thought sadly, a poor, needy fool, thus to be content with Isildur's leavings.>>   
  
He shook his head at his own folly, and sighed just once, softly in the darkness, and then once more began to stroke the dark, tangled hair.  
  
  
END  
  
  
  



End file.
